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Book -^£-^— 

PRESENTED BY \ \ J 




Demeter and Persephone. 



THE 

EPIC OF HADES 

IN THREE BOOKS 



BY 

LEWIS MORRIS 



'■Difficile est proprie communia dicere''^ 



New York: 46 East Fourteenth Street 

THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY 

Boston : 100 Purchase Street 



\n- 



TT^ 



rota- 



"The three excellences of Poetry: simplicity of languagp, sim- 
plicity of subject, and simplicity of invention." — T/i£ IVelsh Triads. 



ata« 

MR. HUTCHtSON, 
t3Je'C5 



TYPOGRAPHY BY C. J. PETERS & SON, BOSTON. 



I'RESSWORK BY BERWICK & SMITH. 



^ 



RICHARD MONCKTON MILNES, 

LORD HOUGHTON, 

THIS POEM IS DEDICATED 

BV 

THE AUTHOR. 



CONTENTS. 



BOOK I. 

TARTARUS. 

PAGE 

Tantalus 6 

Phv^dra i8 

Sisyphus 31 

Clyt^mnestra 42 

BOOK II. 

HADES. 

Marsyas 63 

Andromeda 73 

Action » . 84 

Helen , 92 

EuRYDicE . no 

Orpheus 114 

Deianeira 117 

Laocoon 126 

Narcissus 132 

V 



VI CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Medusa 140 

Adonis 149 

Persephone 153 

Endymion 159 

Psyche 165 



BOOK III. 

OLYMPUS. 

Artemis 181 

Herakles 185 

Aphrodit^ 188 

Athene 193 

Her]& • 198 

Apollo 202 

Zeus 206 



BOOK 1. 

TARTARUS. 



THE EPIC OF HADES. 



In February, when the dawn was slow, 
And winds lay still, I gazed upon the fields 
Which stretched before me, lifeless, and the stream 
Which labored in the distance to the sea. 
Sullen and cold. No force of fancy took 
My thought to bloomy June, when all the land 
Lay deep in crested grass, and through the dew 
The landrail brushed, and the lush banks were set 
With strawberries, and the hot noise of bees 
Lulled the bright flowers. Rather I seemed to move 
Thro' that weird land, Hellenic fancy feigned. 
Beyond the fabled river and the bark 
Of Charon ; and forthwith on every side 



Rose the thin throng of ghosts. 



First thro' the gloom 



Of a dark grove I strayed — a sluggish wood. 
Where scarce the faint fires of the setting stars, 



4 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Or some gold gleam of half-discovered dawn, 
Might pierce the darkling pines. A twilight drear 
Brooded o'er all the depths, and filled the dank 
And sunken hollows of the rocks with shapes 
Of terror, — beckoning hands and noiseless feet 
Flitting from shade to shade, wide eyes that stared 
With horror, and dumb mouths which seemed to cry, 
Yet cried not. An ineffable despair 
Hung over them and that dark world and took 
The gazer captive, and a mingled pang 
Of grief and anger, grown to fierce revolt 
And hatred of the Invisible Force which holds 
The issue of our lives and binds us fast 
Within the net of Fate ; as the fisher takes 
The little quivering sea-things from the sea 
And flings them panting down to die on the shore, 
Then spreads his net for more. And then again 
I knew myself and those, creatures who lie 
Safe in the strong grasp of Unchanging Law, 
Encompassed round by hands unseen, and chains 
Which do support the feeble life that else 
Were spent on barren space ; and thus I came 
To look with less of horror, more of thought, 
And bore to see the sight of pain that yet 
Should grow to healing, when the concrete stain 



THE EPIC OF HADES. 5 

Of life and act were purged, and the cleansed soul, 
Renewed by the slow wear and waste of time. 
Soared after aeons of days. 

They seemed alone, 
Those prisoners, thro' all time. Each soul shut fast 
In its own jail of woe, apart, alone. 
For evermore alone ; no thought of kin, 
Or kindly human glance, or fellowship 
Of suffering or of sin, made light the load 
Of solitary pain. Ay, though they walked 
Together, or were prisoned in one cell 
With the partners of their wrong, or with strange 

souls 
Which the same Furies tore, they knew them not, 
But suffered still alone ; as in that shape 
Of hell fool-s build on earth, where hopeless sin 
Rots slow in solitude, nor sees the face 
Of men, nor hears the sound of speech, nor feels 
The touch of human hand, but broods a ghost. 
Hating the bare blank cell — the other self. 
Which brought it thither — hating man and God, 
And all that is or has been. 



THE EPIC OF HADES. 



A great fear 
And pity froze my blood, who seemed to see 
A half-remembered form. 

An Eastern King 
It was who lay in pain. He wore a crown 
Upon his painful brow, and his white robe 
Was jewelled with fair gems of price, the signs 
Of pomp and honor and all luxury. 
Which might prevent desire. But as I looked 
There came a hunger in the gloating eyes, 
A quenchless thirst upon the parching lips, 
And such unsatisfied strainings in the hands 
Stretched idly forth on what I could not see, 
Some fatal food of fancy ; that I knew 
The undying worm of sense, which frets and gnaws 
The unsatisfied stained soul. 

Seeing me, he said : 
"What? And art thou too damned as I.? Dost 

know 
This thirst as I, and see as I the cool 
Lymph drawn from thee and mock thy lips ; and 

parch 



TANTALUS. J 

For ever in continual thirst ; and mark 

Tlie fair fruit offered to thy hunger fade 

Before thy longing eyes ? I thought there was 

No other as I thro' all the weary lengths 

Of Time the gods have made, who pined so long 

And found fruition mock him. 

Long ago, 
When I was young on earth, 'twas a sweet pain 
To ride all day in the long chase, and feel 
Toil and the summer fire my blood and parch 
My lips, while in my father's halls I knew 
The cool bath waited, with its marble floor; 
And juices from the ripe fruits pressed, and chilled 
With snows from far-off peaks ; and troops of 

slaves ; 
And music and the dance ; and fair young forms. 
And dalliance, and every joy of sense. 
That haunts the-dreams of youth, which strength and 

ease 
Corrupt, and vacant hours. Ay, it was sweet 
For a while to plunge in these, as fair boys plunge 
Naked in summer streams, all veil of shame 
Laid by, only the young dear body bathed 
And sunk in its delight, while the firm earth. 
The soft green pastures gay with innocent flowers, 



8 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Or sober harvest fields, show like a dream ; 

And nought is left, but the young life which floats 

Upon the depths of death, to sink, maybe, 

And drown in pleasure, or rise at length grown wise 

And gain the abandoned shore. 

Ah, but at last 
The swift desire waxed stronger and more strong, 
And feeding on itself, grows tyrannous ; 
And the parched soul no longer finds delight 
In the cool stream of old ; nay, this itself, 
Smitten by the fire of sense as by a flame, 
Holds not its coolness more ; and fevered limbs. 
Seeking the fresh tides of their youth, may find 
No more refreshment, but a caldron fired 
With the fires of nether hell ; and a black rage 
Usurps the soul, and drives it on to slake 
Its thirst with crime and blood. 

Longing Desire ! 
Unsatisfied, sick, impotent Desire ! 
Oh, I have known it ages long. I knew 
Its pain on earth ere yet my life had grown 
To its full stature, thro' the weary years 
Of manhood, nay, in age itself ; I knew 
The quenchless weary thirst, unsatisfied 
By all the charms of sense, by wealth and power 



TANTALUS. 9 

And homage ; always craving, never quenched — 
The undying curse of the soul ! The ministers 
And agents of my will drave far and wide 
Through all the land for me, seeking to find 
Fresh pleasures for me, who had spent my sum 
Of pleasure, and had power, not even in thought, 
Nor faculty to enjoy. They tore apart 
The sacred claustral doors of home for me. 
Defiled the inviolate hearth for me, laid waste 
The flower of humble lives, in hope to heal 
The sickly fancies of the king, till rose 
A cry of pain from all the land ; and I 
Grew happier for it, since I held the power 
To quench desire in blood. 

But even thus 
The old pain faded not, but swift again 
Revived ; and thro' the sensual dull lengths 
Of my seraglios I stalked, and marked 
The glitter of the gems, the precious webs 
Plundered from every clime by cruel wars 
That strewed the sands with corpses ; lovely eyes 
That looked no look of love, and fired no more 
Thoughts of the flesh ; rich meats, and fruits, and 

wines 
Grown flat and savorless ; and loathed them all, 



lO THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And only cared for power ; content to shed 
Rivers of innocent blood, if only thus 
I might appease my thirst. Until I grew 
A monster gloating over blood and pain. 

Ah, weary, weary days, when every sense 
Was satisfied, and nothing left to slake 
The parched unhappy soul, except to watch 
The writhing limbs and mark the slow blood drip, 
Drop after drop, as the life ebbed with it ; 
In a new thrill of lust, till blood itself 
Palled on me, and I knew the fiend I was, 
Yet cared not — I who was, brief years ago, 
Only a careless boy lapt round with ease. 
Stretched by the soft and stealing tide of sense 
Which now grew red ; nor ever dreamed at all 
What Furies lurked beneath it, but had shrunk 
In indolent horror from the sight of tears 
And misery, and felt my inmost soul 
Sicken with the thought of blood. There comes a 

time 
When the insatiate brute within the man, 
Weary with wallowing in the mire, leaps forth 
Devouring, and the cloven satyr-hoof 
Grows to the rending claw, and the lewd leer 



TANTALUS. II 

To the horrible fanged snarl, and the soul sinks 
And leaves the man a devil, all his sin 
Grown savorless, and yet he longs to sin 
And longs in vain for ever. 

Yet, methinks. 
It was not for the gods to leave me thus. 
I stinted not their worship, building shrines 
To all of them ; the Goddess of Love I served 
With hecatombs, letting the fragrant fumes 
Of incense and the costly steam ascend 
From victims year by year ; nay, my own son 
Pelops, my best beloved, I gave to them, 
Offering, as he must offer who would gain 
The great gods' grace, my dearest. 

I had gained 
Through long and weary orgies that strange sense 
Of nothingness and wasted days which blights 
The exhausted life, bearing upon its front 
Counterfeit knowledge, when the bitter ash 
Of Evil, which the sick soul loathes, appears 
Like the pure fruit of Wisdom. I had grown 
As wizards seem, who mingle sensual rites 
And forms impure with murderous spells and dark 
Enchantments ; till the simple people held 
My very weakness wisdom, and believed 



12 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

That in my blood-stained palace-halls, withdrawn, 

I kept the inner mysteries of Zeus 

And knew the secret of all Being ; who was 

A sick and impotent wretch, so sick, so tired. 

That even bloodshed palled. 

For my stained soul, 
Knowing its sin, hastened to purge itself 
With every rite and charm which the dark lore 
Of priestcraft offered to it. Spells obscene, 
The blood of innocent babes, sorceries foul 
Muttered at midnight — these could occupy 
My weary days ; till all my people shrank 
To see me, and the mother clasped her child 
Who heard the monster pass. 

They would not hear, 
They listened not — the cold ungrateful gods — 
For all my supplications ; nay, the more 
I sought them were they hidden. 

At the last 
A dark voice whispered nightly : ' Thou, poor wretch, 
That art so sick and impotent, thyself 
The source of all thy misery, the great gods 
Ask a more precious gift and excellent 
Than alien victims which thou prizest not 
And givest without a pang. But shouldst thou take 



TANTALUS. 1 3 

Thy costliest and fairest offering 

'Twere otherwise. The life which thou hast given 

Thou mayst recall. Go, offer at the shrine 

Thy best beloved Pelops, and appease 

Zeus and the averted gods, and know again 

The youth and joy of yore.' 

Night after night, 
While all the halls were still, and the cold stars 
Were fading into dawn, I lay awake 
Distraught with warring thoughts, my throbbing 

brain 
Filled with that dreadful voice. I had not shrunk 
From blood, but this, the strong son of my youth — • 
How should I dare this thing .? And all day long 
I would steal from sight of him and men, and fight 
Against the dreadful thought, until the voice 
Seared all my burning brain, and clamored, ' Kill ! 
Zeus bids thee, and be happy.' Then I rose 
At midnight, when the halls were still, and raised 
The arras, and stole soft to where my son 
Lay sleeping. For one moment on his face 
And stalwart limbs I gazed, and marked the rise 
And fall of his young breast, and the soft plume 
Which drooped upon his brow, and felt a thrill 
Of yearning ; but the cold voice urging me 



14 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Burned me like fire. Three times I gazed and turned 

Irresolute, till last it thundered at me, 

' Strike, fool ! thou art in hell ; strike, fool ! and lose 

The burden of thy chains.' Then with slow step 

I crept as creeps the tiger on the deer. 

Raised high my arm, shut close my eyes, and plunged 

My dagger in his heart. 

And then, with a flash, 
The veil fell downward from my life and left 
Myself to me — the daily sum of sense — 
The long continual trouble of desire — 
The stain of blood blotting the stain of lust — 
The weary foulness of my days, which wrecked 
My heart and brain, and left me at the last 
A madman and accursed ; and I knew, 
Far higher than the sensual slope which held 
The gods whom erst I worshipped, a white peak 
Of Purity, and a stern voice pealing doom — 
Not the mad voice of old — which pierced so deep 
Within my life, that with the reeking blade 
Wet with the heart's blood of my child I smote 
My guilty heart in twain. 

Ah ! fool, to dream 
That the long stain of time might fade and merge 
In one poor chrism of blood. They taught of yore, 



TANTALUS. 1 5 

My priests who flattered me — nor knew at all 

The greater God I know, who sits afar 

Beyond those earthly shapes, passionless, pure, 

And awful as the Dawn — that the gods cared 

For costly victims, drinking in the steam 

Of sacrifice when the choice hecatombs 

Were offered for my wrong. Ah no ! there is 

No recompense in these, nor any charm 

To cleanse the stain of sin, but the long wear 

Of suffering, when the soul which seized too much 

Of pleasure here, grows righteous by the pain 

Which doth redress its wrong. For what is Right 

But equipoise of Nature, alternating 

The Too Much and Too Little ? Not on earth 

The salutary silent forces work 

Their final victory, but year on year 

Passes, and age on age, and leaves the debt 

Unsatisfied, while the o'erburdened soul 

Unloads itself in pain. 

Therefore it is 
I suffer as I suffered ere swift death 
Set me not free, no otherwise ; and yet 
There comes a healing purpose in my pain 
I never knew on earth ; nor ever here 
The once-loved evil grows, only the tale 



1 6 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Of penalties grown greater hourly dwarfs 
The accomplished sum of wrong. And yet desire 
Pursues me still — sick, impotent desire, 
Fiercer than that of earth. 

We are ourselves 
Our heaven and hell, the joy, the penalty. 
The yearning, the fruition. Earth is hell 
Or heaven, and yet not only earth ; but still, 
After the swift soul leaves the gates of death, 
The pain grows deeper and less mixed, the joy 
Purer and less alloyed, and we are damned 
Or blest, as we have lived." 

He ceased, with a wail 
Like some complaining wind among the pines 
Or pent among the wave-worn ocean caves, 
A sick, sad sound. 

Then as I looked, I saw 
His eyes glare horribly, his dry parched lips 
Open, his weary hands stretch idly forth 
As if to clutch the air — infinite pain 
And mockery of hope. " Seest thou them now .? " 
He said. " I thirst, I parch, I famish, yet 
They still elude me, fair and tempting fruit 
And cooling waters. Now they come again. 
See, they are in my grasp, they are at my lips, 



TANTALUS. 1/ 

Now I shall quench me. Nay, again they fly 
And mock me. Seest thou them, or am I shut 
From hope for ever, hungering, thirsting still, 
A madman and in Hell 'i " 

And as I passed 
In horror, his large eyes and straining hands 
Froze all my soul with pity. 



1 8 THE EPIC OF HADES. 



Then it was 
A woman whom I saw : a dark pale Queen, 
With passion in her eyes, and fear and pain 
Holding her steadfast gaze, like one who sees 
Some dreadful deed of wrong worked out and knows 
Himself the cause, yet now is powerless 
To stay the wrong he would. 

Seeing me gaze 
In pity on her woe, she turned and spake 
With a low wailing voice — 

" Thou well mayst gaze 
With horror on me, sir, for I am lost ; 
I have shed the innocent blood, long years ago, 
Nay, centuries of pain. I have shed the blood 
Of him I loved, and found for recompense 
But self-inflicted death and age-long woe. 
Which purges not my sin. And yet not I 
It was who did it, but the gods, who took 
A woman's loveless heart and tortured it 
With love as with a fire. It was not I 
Who slew my love, but Fate. Fate 'twas whicli 
brought 



PIJ^DRA. 19 

My love and me together, Fate which barred 
The path of blameless love, yet set Love's flame 
To burn and smoulder in a hopeless heart, 
Where no relief might come. 

The King was old, 
And I a girl. 'Tis an old tale which runs 
Thro' the sad ages, and 'twas mine. He had spent 
His sum of love long since, and I — I knew not 
A breath of Love as yet. Ah, it is strange 
To lose the sense of maidenhood, drink deep 
Of life to the very dregs, and yet not know 
A flutter of Love's wing. Love takes no thought 
For pomp, or palace, or respect of men ; 
Nor always in the stately marriage bed. 
Closed round by silken curtains, laid on down, 
Nestles a rosy form ; but 'mid wild flowers 
Or desert tents, or in the hind's low cot. 
Beneath the aspect of the unconscious stars. 
Dwells all night and is blest. 

My love, my life ! 
He was the old man's son, a fair white soul — 
Not like the others, whom the fire of youth 
Burns like a flame and hurries unrestrained . ' 

Thro' riotous days and nights, but virginal 
And pure as any maid. No wandering glance 



20 THE Eric OF HADES. 

He deigned for all the maidens young and fair 

Who sought their Prince's eye. But evermore, 

Upon the high lawns wandering alone, 

He dwelt unwed; weaving to Artemis, 

Fairest of all Olympian maids, a wreath 

Fro-m the unpolluted meads, where never herd 

Drives his white flock, nor ever scythe has come, 

But the bee sails upon unfettered wmg 

Over the spring-like lawns, and Purity 

Waters them with soft dews ; i and yet he showed 

Of all his peers most manly — heart and soul 

A very man, tender and true, and strong 

And pitiful, and in his limbs and mien 

Fair as Apollo's self. 

It was at first 
In Troezen that I saw him, when he came 
To greet his sire. Amid the crowd of youths 
He showed a Prince indeed; yet knew I not 
Whom 'twas I saw, nor that I held the place 
Which was his mother's, only from the throng 
Love, with a barbed dart aiming, pierced my heart 
Ere yet I knew what ailed me. Every glance 
Fired me ; the youthful grace, the tall straight limbs, 
The swelling sinewy arms, the large dark eyes 

1 Euripides, " Hippolytus," lines 70-78. 



PH^DRA. 2 1 

Tender yet full of passion, the thick locks 

Tossed from his brow, the lip and cheek which 

bore 
The down of early manhood, seemed to feed 
My heart with short-lived joy. 

For when he stood 
Forth from the throng and knelt before his sire, 
Then raised his eyes to mine, I felt the curse 
Of Aphrodite burn me, as it burned 
My mother before me, and I dared not meet 
His innocent, frank young eyes. 

Said I then young ? 
Ay, but not young as mine. But I had known 
The secret things of life, which age the soul 
In a moment, writing on its front their mark 
' Too early ripe ; ' and he was innocent, 
My spouse in fitted years, within whose arms 
I had defied the world. 

I turned away 
Like some white bird that leaves the flock, which 

sails 
High in mid air above the haunts of men, 
Feeling some little dart within her breast, 
Not death, but like to death, and slowly sinks 
Down to the earth alone, and bears her hurt 



22 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Unseen, by herbless sand and bitter pool, 
And pines until the end. 

Even from that day 
I strove to gain his love. Nay, 'twas not I, 
But the cruel gods who drove me. Day by day 
We were together ; for in days of old 
Women were free, not pent in gilded jails 
As afterwards, but free to walk alone, 
For good or evil, free. I hardly took 
Thought for my spouse, the King. For I had found 
My love at last : what matter if it were 
A guilty love ? Yet love is love indeed, • 
Stronger than heaven or hell. Day after day 
I set myself to tempt him from his proud 
And innocent way, for I had spurned aside 
Care for the gods or men — all but my love. 

What need to tell the tale? Was it a sigh, 
A blush, a momentary glance, which brought 
Assurance of my triumph? It is long 
Since I have lived, I cannot tell ; I know 
Only the penalty of death and hell 
Which followed on my sin. I knew he loved. 
It was not wonderful, seeing that we dwelt 
A boy and girl together. I was fair. 



PHyEDRA. 23 

And Eros fired my eyes and lent my voice 

His own soft tremulous tones. But when our souls 

Trembled upon the verge, and fancy feigned 

His arms around me as we fled alone 

To some free land of exile, lo ! a scroll : 

' Dearest, it may not be ; I fear the Gods ; 

We dare not do this wrong. I go from hence 

And see thy face no more. Farewell ! Forget 

The love we may not own ; go, seek for both 

Forgiveness from the gods.' 

When I read the words, 
The cruel words, methought my heart stood still. 
And when the ebbing life returned I seemed 
To have lost all thought of Love. Only Revenge 
Dwelt with me still, the fiercer that I knew 
My long-prized hope, which came so near success, 
Snatched from me and for ever. 

When I rose 
From my deep swoon, I bade a messenger 
Go, seek the King for me. He came and sate 
Beside my couch, and all the doors were closed, 
And all withdrawn. Then with the liar's art. 
And hypocrite tears, and feigned reluctancy. 
And all the subtle wiles a woman draws 
From the armory of hate, I did instil 



24 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The poison to his soul. Cunning devices, 
Feigned sorrow, mention of his son, regrets, 
And lialf confessions — these, witli hateful skill 
Confused together, drove the old man's soul 
To frenzy ; and I watched him, with a sneer, 
Turn to a dotard thirsting for the life 
Of his own child. But how to do the deed, 
Yet shed no blood, nor know the people's hate, 
Who loved the Prince, I knew not. 

Till one day 
The old man, looking out upon the sea. 
Besought the dread Poseidon to avenge 
The treachery of his son. Even as we stood 
Gazing upon the breathless blue, a cloud 
Rose from the deep, a little fleecy cloud, 
Which sudden grew and grew, and turned the blue 
To purple ; and a swift wind rose and sang 
Higher and higher, and the wine-dark sea 
Grew ruffled, and within the circling bay 
The tiny ripples, stealing up the sand. 
Plunged loud with manes of foam, until they swelled 
To misty surges thundering on the shore. 

Then at the old man's elbow as I stood, 
A deep dark thought, sent by the powers of ill, 



PH^DRA. 25 

Answering, as now I know, my own black hate 

And not my poor dupe's anger, fired my soul 

And bade me speak. ' The god has heard thy prayer,' 

J' whispered ; ' See the surge which wakes and swells 

To fury; well I know what things shall be. 

It is Poseidon's voice sounds in the storm 

And sends thy vengeance. Young Hippolytus 

Loves, as thou knowest, on the yellow sand, 

Hard by the rippled margin of the wave. 

To urge his flying steeds. Bid him go forth — 

He will obey — and see what recompense 

The god will send his wrong.' 

In the old man's eyes 
A watery gleam of malice played awhile — 
I hated him for it — -and he bade his son 
Drive forth his chariot on the sand, and yoke 
His three young fiery steeds. 

And still the storm 
Blew fiercer and more fierce, and the white crests 
Plunged on the strand, and the high promontories 
Resounded counter-stricken, and a mist 
Of foam, blown landward, hid the sounding shore. 

Then I saw him come forth and bid them yoke 
His untamed colts. I had not seen his face 



26 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Since that last day, but, seeing him, I felt 

The old love spring anew, yet mixed with hate — 

A storm of warring passions. Tho' I knew 

What end should come, yet would I speak no woi^l 

That might avert it. The old man looked forth ; 

I think he had well-nigh forgotten all 

The wrong he fancied and the doom he prayed. 

All but the father's pride in the strong son. 

Who was so young and bold. I saw a smile 

Upon the dotard's face, when now the steeds 

Were harnessed and the chariot, on the sand 

Along the circling margin of the bay, 

Flew, swift as light. A sudden gleam of sun 

Flashed on the silver harness as it went. 

Burned on the brazen axles of the wheels; 

And on the golden fillets of the Prince 

Doubled the gold. Sometimes a larger wave 

Would dash in mist around him, and in fear 

The rearing coursers plunged, and then again 

The strong young arm constrained them, and they 

flashed 
To where the wave-worn foreland ends the bay. 

And then he turned his chariot, a bright "speck 
Now seen, now hidden, but always, tho' the surge . 



PH^DRA. 27 

Broke round it, safe ; emerging like a star 

From the white clouds of foam. And as I watched, 

Speaking no word, and breathing scarce a breath, 

I saw the firm limbs strongly set apart 

Upon the chariot, and the reins held high, 

And the proud head bent forward, with long locks 

Streaming behind, as nearer and more near 

The swift team rushed — until, with a half joy. 

It seemed as if my love might yet elude 

The slow sure anger of the god, dull wrath 

Swayed by a woman's lie. 

But on the verge, 
As I cast my eyes, a vast and purple wall 
Swelled swiftly towards the land ; the lesser waves 
Sank as it came, and to its toppling crest 
The spume-flecked waters, from the strand drawn 

back, 
Left dry the yellow shore. Onward it came. 
Hoarse, capped with breaking foam, lurid, immense. 
Rearing its dreadful height. The chariot sped 
Nearer and nearer. I could see my love 
With the light of victory in his eyes, the smile 
Of daring on his lips : so near he came 
To where the marble palace-wall confined 
The narrow strip of beach — his brave young eyes 



28 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Fixed steadfast on the goal, in the pride of life, 
Without a thought of death. I strove to cry, 
But terror choked my breath. Then, like a bull 
Upon the windy level of the plain 
Lashing himself to rage, the furious wave, 
Poising itself a moment, tossing high 
Its wind-vexed crest, dashed downward on the strand, 
With a stamp, with a rush, with a roar. 

And when I looked. 
The shore, the fields, the plain, were one white sea 
Of churning, seething foam — chariot and steeds 
Gone, and my darling on the wave's white crest 
Tossed high, whirled down, beaten, and bruised, and 

flung. 
Dying upon the marble. 

My great love 
Sprang up redoubled, and cast out my hate 
And spurned all thought of fear ; and down the stair 
I hurried, and upon the bleeding form 
I threw myself, and raised his head, and clasped 
His body to mine, and kissed him on the lips. 
And in his dying ear confessed my wrong. 
And saw the horror in his dying eyes 
And knew that I was damned. And when he 

breathed 



PH^DRA. 29 

His last pure breath, I rose and slowly spake — 
Turned to a Fury now by love and pain — 
To the old man who knelt, while all the throng 
Could hear my secret : ' See, thou fool, I am 
The murderess of thy son, and thou my dupe, 
Thou and thy gods. See, he was innocent; 
I murdered him for love. I scorn ye all. 
Thee and thy gods together, who are deceived 
By a woman's lying tongue ! Oh, doting fool. 
To hate thy own! And ye, false powers, which 

punish 
The innocent, and let the guilty soul 
Escape unscathed, I hate ye all — I curse, 
I loathe you ! ' 

Then I stooped and kissed my love, 
And left them in amaze ; and up the stair 
Swept slowly to my chamber, and therein, 
Hating my life and cursing men and gods, 
I did myself to death. 

But even here, 
I find my punishment. Oh, dreadful doom 
Of souls like mine ! To see their evil done 
Always before their eyes, the one dread scene 
Of horror. See, the dark wave on the verge 
Towers horrible, and he — Oh, Love, my Love! 



30 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Safety is near ! quick! quicker! urge them on! 
Thou wilt 'scape it yet ! — Nay, nay, it bursts on him ! 
I have shed the innocent blood ! Oh, dreadful gaze 
Within his glazing eyes ! Hide them, ye gods ! 
Hide them ! I cannot bear them. Quick ! a dagger ! 
I will lose their glare in death. Nay, die I cannot; 
I must endure and live — Death brings not peace 
To the lost souls in Hell." 

And her eyes stared, 
Rounded with horror, and she stooped and gazed 
So eagerly, and pressed her fevered hands 
Upon her trembling forehead with such pain 
As drives the gazer mad. 



SISYPHUS. 31 



Then as I passed, 
I marked against the hardly dawning sky 
A toilsome figure standing, bent and strained. 
Before a rocky mass, which with great pain 
And agony of labor it would thrust 
Up a steep hill. But when upon the crest 
It poised a moment, then I held my breath 
With dread, for, lo ! the poor feet seemed to clutch 
The hillside as in fear, and the poor hands 
With hopeless fingers pressed into the stone 
In agony, and the limbs stiffened, and a cry 
Like some strong swimmer's, whom the mightier 

stream 
Sweeps downward, and he sees his children's eyes 
Upon the bank, broke from him ; and at last, 
After long struggles of despair, the limbs 
Relaxed, and as I closed my fearful eyes, 
Seeing the inevitable doom — a crash, 
A horrible thunderous noise, as down the steep 
The shameless fragment leapt. From crag to crag 
It bounded ever swifter, striking fire 
And wrapt in smoke, as to the lowest depths 



32 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Of the vale it tore, and seemed to take with it 
The miserable form whose painful gaze 
I caught, as with the great rock whirled and dashed 
Downward, and m.arking every crag with gore 
And long gray hairs, it plunged, yet living still, 
To the black hollow ; and then a silence came 
More dreadful than the noise, and a low groan 
Was all that I could hear. 

When to the foot 
Of the dark steep I hurried, half in hope 
To find the victim dead — not recognizing 
The undying life of Hell — I seemed to see 
An aged man, bruised, bleeding, with gray hairs. 
And eyes from which the cunning leer of greed 
Was scarcely yet gone out. 

A crafty voice 
It was that answered me, the voice of guile 
Part purified by pain : 

" There comes not death 
To those who live in Hell, nor hardly pause 
Of suffering longer than may serve to make 
The pain renewed, more piercing. Long ago, 
I thought that I had cheated Death, and now 
I seek him ; but he comes not, nor know I 
If ever he will hear me. Whence art thou ? 



SISYPHUS. 33 

Comest thou from earthly air, or whence ? What 

power 
Has brought thee hither? For I know indeed 
Thou art not lost as I ; for never here 
I look upon a human face, nor see 
The ghosts who doubtless here on every side 
Suffer a common pain, only at times 
I hear the echo of a shriek far off, 
Like some faint ghost of woe which fills the pause 
And interval of suffering ; but from whom 
The voice may come, or whence, I know not, only 
The air teems with vague pain, which doth distract 
The ear when for a moment comes surcease 
Of agony, and the sense of effort spent 
In vain and fruitless labor, and the pang 
Of long-deferred defeat, which waits and takes 
The world-worn heart, and maddens it when all — 
Heaven, conscience, happiness, are staked and lost 
For gains which still elude it. 

Yet 'twas sweet, 
A King in early ^-outh, when pleasure is sweet, 
To live the fair successful years, and know 
The envy and respect of men. I cared 
For none of youth's delights : the dance, the song, 
Allured me not ; the smooth soft ways of sense 



34 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Tempted me not at all. I could despise 
The follies that I shared not, spending all 
The long laborious days in toilsome schemes 
To compass honor and wealth, and, as I grew 
In name and fame, finding my hoarded gains 
Transmuted into Power. The seas were white 
With laden argosies, and all were mine. 
The sheltering moles defied the wintry storms, 
And all were mine. The marble aqueducts, 
The costly bridges, all were mine. Fair roads 
Wound round and round the hills — my work. The 

gods 
Alone I heeded not, nor cared at all 
For aught but that my eyes and ears might take. 
Spurning invisible things, nor built I to them 
Temple or shrine, wrapt up in life, set round 
With earthly blessings like a god. I rose 
To such excess of weal and fame and pride, 
My people held me godlike. I grew drunk 
With too great power, scoffing at men and gods, 
Careless of both, but not averse to fling 
To those too weak themselves, what benefits 
My larger wisdom spurned. 

Then suddenly 
I knew the pain of failure. Summer storms 



SISYPHUS. 35 

Sucked down my fleets even within sight of port. 
A grievous blight wasted the harvest-fields, 
Mocking my hopes of gain. Wars came and drained 
My store, and I grew needy, knowing now 
The hell of stronger souls, the loss of power 
Wherein they exulted once. There comes no pain 
Deeper than to have known delight of power, 
And then to lose it all. But I, I would not 
Sit tame beneath defeat, trimming my sails 
To wait the breeze of Fortune — fickle breath 
Which perhaps might breathe no more — but chose 

instead 
By rash conceit and bolder enterprise 
To win her aid again. I had no thought 
Of selfish gain, only to be and act 
As a god to those, feeding my sum of pride 
With acted good. 

But evermore defeat 
Dogged me, and evermore my people grew 
To doubt me, seeing no more the wealth, the force. 
Which once they worshipped. Then the lust of 

power 
Loved, not for sake of others, but itself. 
Grew on me, and the pride which can dare all, 
Save failure only, seized me. Evil finds 



36 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Its ready chance. There were rich argosies 
Upon the seas : I sank them, ship and crew, 
In the unbetraying ocean. Wayfarers 
Crossing the passes with rich merchandise 
My creatures, hid behind the crags, o'erwhehned 
With rocks hurled downward. Yet I spent my gains 
For the public weal, not otherwise ; and they. 
The careless people, took the piteous spoils 
Which cost the lives of many, and a man's soul. 
And blessed the giver. Empty venal blessings, 
Which sting more deep than curses ! 

For awhile 
I was content with this, but at the last 
A great contempt and hatred of them took me, 
The base, vile churls ! Why should I stain my soul 
For such as those — dogs that would fawn and lick 
The hand that fed them, but, if food should fail, 
Would turn and rend me ? I would none of them ; 
I would grow rich and happy, being indeed 
Godlike in brain to such. So with all craft, 
And guile, and violence I enriched me, loading 
My treasuries with gold. My deep-laid schemes 
Of gain engrossed the long laborious days. 
Stretched far into the night. Enjoy, I might not, 
Seeing it was all to do, and life so brief 



SiSYFHtfS. 37 

That ere a man might gain the goal he would, 

Lo ! Age, and with it Death, and so an end ! 

For all the tales of the indignant gods, 

What were they but the priests' ? I had myself 

Broken all oaths ; long time deceived and ruined 

With every phase of fraud the pious fools 

Whom oath-sworn Justice bound ; battened on 

blood ; 
And what was I the worse ? How should the gods 
Bear rule if I were happy ? Death alone 
Was certain. Therefore must I haste to heap 
Treasure sufficient for my need, and then 
Enjoy the gathered good. 

But gradually 
There came — not great disasters which might crush 
All hope, but petty checks which did decrease 
My store, and left my labor vain, and me 
Unwilling to enjoy ; and gradually 
I felt the chill approach of age, which stole 
Higher and higher on me, till the life, 
As in a paralytic, left my limbs 
And heart, and mounted upwards to my brain. 
Its last resort, and rested there awhile 
Ere it should spread its wings. But even thus, 
Tho' powerless to enjoy, the insatiate greed 



38 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And thirst of power sustained me, and supplied 
Life's spark with some scant fuel, till it seemed, 
Year after year, as if I could not die. 
Holding so fast to life. I grew so old 
That all the comrades of my youth, my prime. 
My age, were gone, and I was left alone 
With those who knew me not, bereft of all 
Except my master passion — an old man 
Forlorn, forgotten of the gods and Death. 

So all the people, seeing me grow old 
And prosperous, held me wise, and spread abroad 
Strange fables, growing day by day more strange — 
How I deceived the very gods. They thought 
That I was blest, remembering not the wear 
Of anxious thought, the growing sum of pain, 
The failing ear and eye, the slower limbs, 
Whose briefer name is Age : and yet I trow 
I was not all unhappy, though I knew 
It was too late to enjoy, and though my store 
Increased not as my greed — nay, even sunk down 
A little, year by year. Till, last of all. 
When now my time was come and I had grown 
A little tired of living, a trivial hurt 
Laid me upon my bed ; and as I mused 



SISYPHUS. 39 

On my long life and all its villanies, 

The wickedness I did, the blood I shed, 

The guile, the frauds of years — they came with 

news. 
One now, and now another ; how my schemes 
Were crushed, my enterprises lost, my toil 
And labor all in vain. Day after day 
They brought these tidings, while I longed to rise 
And stay the tide of ill, and raved to know 
I could not. At the last the added sum 
Of evil, like yon great rock poised awhile 
Uncertain, gathered into one, o'erwhelmed 
My feeble strength, and left me ruined and lost, 
And showed me all I was, and all the depth 
And folly of my sin, and racked my brain. 
And sank me in despair and misery. 
And broke my heart and slew me. 

Therefore 'tis 
I spend the long, long centuries which have come 
Between me and my sin, in such dread tasks 
As that thou sawest. In the soul I sinned : 
In body and soul I suffer. What I bade 
My minions do to others, that of woe 
I bear myself ; and in the pause of ill, 
As now, I know again the bitter pang 



40 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Of failure, which of old pierced thro' my soul 

And left me to despair. The pain of mind 

Is fiercer far than any bodily ill, 

And both are mine — the pang of torture-pain 

Always recurring ; and, far worse, the pang 

Of consciousness of black sins sinned in vain — 

The doom of constant failure. 

Will, fierce Will ! 
Thou parent of unrest and toil and woe. 
Measureless effort ! growing day by day 
To force strong souls along the giddy steep 
That slopes to the pit of Hell, where effort serves 
Only to speed destruction ! Yet I know 
Thou art not, as some hold, the primal curse 
Which doth condemn us; since thou bearest in thee 
No power to satisfy thyself ; but rather, 
The spring of act, whereby in earth and heaven 
Both men and gods do breathe and live and are, 
Since Life is Act and not to Do is Death — 
I do not blame thee : but to work in vain 
Is bitterest penalty : to find at last 
The soul all fouled with sin and stained with blood 
In vain ; ah, this is hell indeed — the hell 
Of lost and striving souls ! " 

Then as I passed 



SISYPHUS. 41 

bent itself again 
To the old task, and up the rugged steep 
Thrust the great rock with groanings. Horror 

chained 
My parting footsteps, like a nightmare dream 
Which holds us that we flee not, with wide eyes 
That loathe to see, yet cannot choose but gaze 
Till all be done. Slowly, with dreadful toil 
And struggle and strain, and bleeding hands and 

knees. 
And more than mortal strength, against the hill 
He pressed, the wretched one ! till with long pain 
He trembled on the summit, a gaunt form. 
With that great rock above him, poised and strained, 
Now gaining, now receding, now in act 
To win the summit, now borne down again, 
And then the inevitable crash — the mass 
Leaping from crag to crag. But ere it ceased 
In dreadful silence, and the low groan came, 
My limbs were loosed with one convulsive bound ; 
I hid my face within my hands, and fled, 
Surfeit with horror. 



42 THE EPIC OF HADES. 



Then it was again 
A woman whom I saw, pitiless, stern. 
Bearing the brand of blood — a lithe dark form, 
And cruel eyes which glared beneath the gems 
Which argued her a Queen, and on her side 
An ancient stain of gore, which did befoul 
Her royal robe. A murderess in thought 
And dreadful act, who took within the toils 
Her kingly Lord, and slew him of old time 
After burnt Troy. I had no time to speak 
When she shrieked thus : 

" It doth repent me not. 
I would 'twere yet to do, and I would do it 
Again a thousand times, if the shed blood 
Might for one hour restore to me the kisses 
Of my ^gisthus. Oh, he was divine, 
My hero, with the godhke locks and eyes 
Of Eros' self ! What boots it that they prate 
Of wifely duty, love of spouse or child. 
Honor or pity, when the swift fire takes 
A woman's heart, and burns it out, and leaps 
With fierce forked tongue around it, till it lies 



CLYT^MNESTRA. ' 43 

In ashes, a dead heart, nor aught remains 
Of old affections, naught but the new flame 
Which is unquenched desire ? 

It did not come, 
My blessing, all at once, but the slow fruit 
Of solitude and midnight loneliness. 
And weary waiting for the tardy news 
Of taken Troy. Long years I sate alone. 
Widowed, within my palace, while my Lord 
Was over seas, waging the accursed war. 
First of the file of Kings. Year after year 
Came false report, or harder, no report 
Of the great fleet. The summers waxed and waned. 
The wintry surges smote the sounding shores, 
And yet there came no end of it. They brought 
Now hopeless failure, now great victories ; 
And all alike were false, all but delay 
And hope deferred, which cometh not, but breaks 
The heart which suffering wrings not. 

So I bore 
Long time the solitary years, and sought 
To solace the dull days with motherly cares 
For those my Lord had left me. My firstborn, 
Iphigeneia, sailed at first with him 
Upon that fatal voyage, but the young 



44 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Orestes and Electra stayed with me — 

Not dear as she was, for the firstborn takes 

The mother's heart, and, with the milk it draws 

From the mother's virgin breast, drains all the love 

It bore, ay, even tho' the sire be dear ; 

Much more, then, when he is a King indeed. 

Mighty in war and council, but too high 

To stoop to a woman's iove. But she was gone, 

Nor heard I tidings of her, knowing not 

If yet she walked the earth, nor if she bare 

The load of children, even as I had borne 

Her in my opening girlhood, when I leapt 

From child to Queen, but never loved the King. 

Thus the slow years rolled onward, till at last 
There came a dreadful rumor — ' She is dead. 
Thy daughter, years ago. The cruel priests 
Clamored for blood; the stern cold Kings stood 

round 
Without a tear, and he, her sire, with them. 
To see a virgin bleed. They cut with knives 
The taper girlish throat ; they watched the blood 
Drip slowly on the sand, and the young life 
Meek as a lamb come to the sacrifice 
To appease the angry gods.' And he, the King, 



CL YT.-EMNESTRA. 45 

Her father, stood by too, and saw them do it. 
The wickedness, breathing no word of wrath. 
Till all was done ! The cowards ! the dull cowards 
I would some black storm, bursting suddenly, 
Had whelmed them and their fleets, ere yet they 

dared 
To waste an innocent life ! 

I had gone mad, 
I know it, but for him, my love, my dear, 
My fair sweet love. He came to comfort me 
With words of friendship, holding that my Lord 
Was bound, perhaps, to let her die — ' The gods 
Were ofttimes hard to appease — or was it indeed 
The priests who asked it ? Were there any gods ? 
Or only phantoms, creatures of the brain, 
Born of the fears of men, the greed of priests, 
Useful to govern women ? Had he been 
Lord of the fleet, not all the soothsayers 
Who ever frighted cowards should have brought 
His soul to such black depths.' I hearkening to 

him 
As 'twere my own thought grown articulate, 
Found my grief turn to hate, and hate to love — 
Hate of my Lord, love of the voice which spoke 
Such dear and comfortable words. And thus. 



46 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Love to a storm of passion growing, swept 
My wounded soul and dried my tears, as dries 
The hot sirocco all the bitter pools 
Of salt among the sand. I never knew 
True love before ; I was a child, no more, 
When the King cast his eyes on me. What is it 
To have borne the weight of offspring 'neath the 

zone. 
If Love be not their sire ; or live long years 
Of commerce, not of love ? Better a day 
Of Passion than the long unlovely years 
Of wifely duty, when Love cometh not 
To wake the barren days ! 

And yet at first 
I hesitated long, nor would embrace 
The blessing that was mine. We are hedged round. 
We women, by such close-drawn ordinances. 
Set round us by our tyrants, that we fear 
To overstep a hand's breadth the dull bounds 
Of custom ; but at last Love, waking in me. 
Burst all my chains asunder, and I lived 
For naught but Love. 

My son, the young Orestes, 
I sent far off; my girl Electra only 
Remained, too young to doubt me, and I knew 



CLYTMMNESTRA. 47 

At last what 'twas to live. 

So the swift years 
Fleeted and found me happy, till the dark 
Ill-omened day when Rumor, thousand-tongued. 
Whispered of taken Troy ; and from my dream 
Of happiness, sudden I woke, and knew 
The coming retribution. We had grown 
Too loving for concealment, and our tale 
Of mutual love was bruited far and wide 
Through Argos. All the gossips bruited it, 
And were all tongue to tell it to the King 
When he should come. And should the cold proud 

Lord 
I never loved, the murderer of my girl. 
Come 'twixt my love and me? A swift resolve 
Flashed through me pondering on it: Love for Love 
And Blood for Blood — the simple golden rule 
Taught by the elder gods. 

When I had taken 
My fixed resolve, I grew impatient for it. 
Counting the laggard days. Oh, it was sweet 
To simulate the yearning of a wife 
Long parted from her Lord, and mock the fools 
Who dogged each look and word, and but for fear 
Had torn me from my throne — the pies, the jays. 



48 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The impotent chatterers, who thought by words 
To stay me in the act ! 'Twas sweet to mock them 
And read distrust within their eyes, when I, 
Knowing my purpose, bade them quick prepare 
All fitting honors for the King, and knew 
They dared not disobey — oh, 'twas enough 
To wing the slow-paced hours. 

But when at last 
I saw his sails upon the verge, and then 
The sea-worn ship, and marked his face grown old, 
The body a little bent, which was so straight, 
The thin gray hairs which were the raven locks 
Of manhood when he went, I felt a moment 
I could not do the deed. But when I saw 
The beautiful sad woman come with him. 
The future in her eyes, and her sad voice 
Proclaim the tale of doom, two thoughts at once 
Assailed me, bidding me despatch with a blow 
Him and his mistress, making sure the will 
Of fate, and my revenge. 

Oh, it was strange 
To see all happen as we planned ; as 'twere 
Some drama oft rehearsed, wherein each step, 
Each word, is so prepared, the poorest player 
Knows his turn come to do — the solemn landing — 



CLYTyEMNESTRA. 49 

The ride to the palace gate — the courtesies 

Of welcome — the mute crowds without — the bath 

Prepared within — the precious circling folds 

Of tissue stretched around him, shutting out 

The gaze, and folding helpless like a net 

The mighty limbs — the battle-axe laid down 

Against the wall, and I, his wife and Queen, 

Alone with him, waiting and watching still, 

Till the woman shrieked without. Then with swift 

step 
I seized the axe, and struck him as he lay 
Helpless, once, twice, and thrice — once for my girl, 
Once for my love, once for the woman, and all 
For Fate and my Revenge ! 

He gave a groan, 
Once only, as I thought he might ; and then 
No sound but the quick gurgling of the blood. 
As it flowed from him in streams, and turned the pure 
And limpid water of the bath to red — 
I had not looked for that — it flowed and flowed. 
And seemed to madden me to look on it. 
Until my love with hands bloody as mine. 
But with the woman's blood, rushed in, and eyes 
Rounded with horror ; and we turned to go, 
And left the dead alone. 



50 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

But happiness 
Still mocked me, and a doubt unknown before 
Came on me, and amid the silken shows 
And luxury of power I seemed to see 
Another answer to my riddle of life 
Than that I gave myself, and it was ' murder ; ' 
And in my people's sullen mien and eyes, 
' Murder; ' and in the mirror, when I looked, 
' Murder ' glared out, and terror lest my son 
Returning, grown to manhood, should avenge 
His father's blood. For somehow, as 'twould seem, 
The gods, if gods there be, or the stern Fate 
Which doth direct our little lives, do filch 
Our happiness — tho' bright with Love's own ray. 
There comes a cloud which veils it. Yet, indeed, 
My days were happy. I repent me not ; 
I would wade through seas of blood to know again 
Those fierce delights once more. 

But my young girl 
Electra, grown to woman, turned from me 
Her modest maiden eyes, nor loved to set 
Her kiss upon my cheek, but, all distraught 
With secret care, hid her from all the pomps 
And revelries which did befit her youth. 
Walking alone ; and often at the tomb 



CL YT^MNES TRA . 5 I 

Of her lost sire they found her, pouring out 

Libations to the dead. And evermore 

I did bethink me of my son Orestes, 

Who now should be a man ; and yearned sometimes 

To see his face^ yet feared lest from his eyes 

His father's soul should smite me. 

So I lived 
Happy and yet unquiet — a stern voice 
Speaking of doom, which long time softer notes 
Of careless weal, the music which doth spring 
From the fair harmonies of life and love, 
Would drown in their own concord. This at times. 
Nay, day by day, stronger and dreadfuller. 
With dominant accent, marred the sounds of joy 
By one prevailing discord. So at length 
I came to lose the Present in the dread 
Of what might come ; the penalty that waits 
Upon successful sin ; who, having sinned, 
Had missed my sin's reward. 

Until one day 
I, looking from my palace casement, saw 
A humble suppliant, clad in pilgrim garb, 
Approach the marble stair. A sudden throb 
Thrilled thro' me, and the mother's heart went forth 
Thro' all disguise of garb and rank and years, 



52 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Knowing my son. How fair he was, how tall 

And vigorous, my boy ! What strong straight limbs 

And noble port! How beautiful the shade 

Of manhood on his lip ! I longed to burst 

From my chamber down, yearning to throw myself 

Upon his neck within the palace court. 

Before the guards — spurning my queenly rank. 

All but my motherhood. And then a chill 

Of doubt o'erspread me, knowing what a gulf 

Fate set between our lives, impassable 

As that great gulf which yawns 'twixt life and death 

And 'twixt this Hell and Heaven. I shrank back. 

And turned to think a moment, half in fear. 

And half in pain ; dividing the swift mind, 

Yet all in love. 

Then came a cry, a groan, 
From the inner court, the clash of swords, the fall 
Of a body on the pavement ; and one cried, 
' The King is dead, slain by the young Orestes, 
Who Cometh hither.' With the word, the door 
Flew open, and my son stood straight before me, 
His drawn sword dripping blood. Oh, he was fair 
And terrible to see, when from his limbs, 
The suppliant's mantle fallen, left the mail 
And arms of a young warrior. Love and Hate, 



CLYT^MNESTRA. 53 

Which are the offspring of a common sire, 
Strove for the mastery, till within his eyes 
I saw his father's ghost glare unappeased 
From out Love's casements. 

Then I knew my fate 
And his — mine to be slain by my son's hand, 
And his to slay me, since the Furies drave 
Our lives to one destruction ; and I took 
His point within my breast. 

But I praise not 
The selfish, careless gods who wrecked our lives, 
Making the King the murderer of his girl. 
And me his murderess ; making my son 
The murderer of his mother and her love — 
A mystery of blood ! — I curse them all, 
The careless Forces, sitting far withdrawn 
Upon the heights pf Space, taking men's lives 
For playthings, and deriding as in sport 
Our happiness and woe — I curse them all. 
We have a right to joy ; we have a right, 
I say, as they have. Let them stand confessed 
The puppets that they are — too weak to give 
The good they feign to love, since Fate, too strong 
For them as us, beyond their painted sky, 
Sits and derides them, too. I curse Fate too, 



54 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The deaf blind Fury, taking human souls 
And crushing them, as a dull fretful child 
Crushes its toys and knows not with what skill 
Those feeble forms are feigned. 

I curse, I loathe, 
I spit on them. It doth repent me not. 
I would 'twere yet to do. I have lived my life. 
I have loved. See, there he lies within the bath, 
And thus I smite him ! thus ! Didst hear him groan? 
Oh, vengeance, thou art sweet ! What, living still .? 
Ah me ! we cannot die ! Come, torture me, 
Ye Furies — for I love not soothing words — 
As once ye did my son. Ye miserable 
Blind ministers of Hell, I do defy you ; 
Not all your torments can undo the Past 
Of Passion and of Love ! " 

Even as she spake 
There came a viewless trouble in the air, 
Which took her, and a sweep of wings unseen. 
And terrible sounds, which swooped on her and 

hushed 
Her voice, and seemed to occupy her soul 
With horror and despair ; and as she passed 
I marked her agonized eyes. 



THE EPIC OF HADES. 55 



But as I went, 
Full many a dreadful shape of lonely pain 
I saw. What need to tell them ? We are filled 
Who live to-day with a more present sense 
Of the great love of God, than those of old 
Who, groping in the dawn of Knowledge, saw 
Only dark shadows of the Unknown ; or he, 
First-born of modern singers, who swept deep 
His awful lyre, and woke the voice of song, 
Dumb for long centuries of pain. We dread 
To dwell on those long agonies its sin 
Brings on the offending soul ; who hold a creed 
Of deeper Pity, knowing what chains of ill 
Bind round our petty lives. Each phase of woe, 
Suffering, and torture which the gloomy thought 
Of bigots feigns for others — all were there. 
One there was stretched upon a rolling wheel. 
Which was the barren round of sense, which still 
Returned upon itself and broke the limbs 
Bound to it day and night. Others I saw 
Doomed, with unceasing toil, to fill the urns 
Whose precious waters sank ere they could slake 



56 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Their burning thirst. Another shapeless soul, 
Full of revolts and hates and tyrannous force, 
The weight of earth, which was its earth-born taint, 
Pressed groaning down, while with fierce beak and 

claw 
The vulture of remorse, piercing his breast, 
Preyed on his heart. For others, overhead, 
Great crags of rock impending seemed to fall, 
But fell not nor brought peace. I felt my soul 
Blunted with horrors, yearning to escape 
To where, upon the limits of the wood. 
Some scanty twilight grew. 

But ere I passed 
From those grim shades a deep voice sounded near, 
A voice without a form. 

" There is an end 
Of all things that thou seest! There is an end 
Of Wrong and Death and Hell ! When the long 

wear 
Of Time and Suffering has effaced the stain 
Ingrown upon the soul, and the cleansed spirit, 
Long ages floating on the wandering winds 
Or rolling deeps of Space, renews itself 
And doth regain its dwelling, and, once more 
Blent with the general order, floats anew 



THE EPIC OF HADES. S7 

Upon the stream of Things,^ and comes at length, 
After new deaths, to that dim waiting-place 
Thou next shalt see, and with the justified 
White souls awaits the End ; or, snatched at once, 
If Fate so will, to the pure sphere itself. 
Lives and is blest, and works the Eternal Work 
Whose name and end is Love ! There is an end 
Of Wrong and Death and Hell ! " 

Even as I heard, 
I passed from out the shadow of Death and Pain, 
Crying, " There is an end ! " 

Virgil, "^Eneid," vi. 740. 



END OF BOOK 



BOOK II. 

HADES. 



Then from those dark 
And dreadful precincts passing, ghostly fields 
And voiceless took me. A faint twilight veiled 
The leafless, shadowy trees and herbless plains. 
There stirred no breath of air to wake to life 
The slumbers of the world. The sky above 
Was one gray, changeless cloud. There looked no 

eye 
Of Life from the veiled heavens ; but Sleep and 

Death 
Were round me everywhere. And yet no fear 
Nor horror took me here, where was no pain 
Nor dread, save that strange tremor which assails 
One who in life's hot noontide looks on death 
And knows he too shall die. The ghosts which rose 
From every darkling copse showed thin and pale — 
Thinner and paler far than those I left 
In agony ; even as Pity seems to wear 
A thinner form than Fear. 



62 THE Eric OF HADES. 

Like those the avenging Furies purged were these, 
Nor that dim land as those black cavernous depths 
Where no hope comes. Fair souls were they and 

white 
Whom there I saw, waiting as we shall wait, 
The Beatific End, but thin and pale 
As the young faith which made them ; touched a 

little 
By the sad memories of the earth ; made glad 
A little by past joys : no more ; and wrapt 
In musing on the brief play played by them 
Upon the lively earth, yet ignorant 
Of the long lapse of years, and what had been 
Since they too breathed Life's air, or if they knew, 
Keeping some echo only ; but their pain 
Was fainter than their joy, and a great hope 
Like ours possessed them dimly. 



AIAKSVAS. 63 



First I saw 
A youth who pensive leaned against the trunk 
Of a dark cypress, and an idle flute 
Hung at his side. A sorrowful sad soul, 
Such as sometimes he knows, who meets the gaze. 
Mute, uncomplaining yet most pitiful. 
Of one whom Nature, by some secret spite, 
Has maimed and left imperfect ; or the pain 
Which fills a poet's eyes. Beneath his robe 
I seemed to see the scar of cruel stripes, 
Too hastily concealed. Yet was he not 
Wholly unhappy, but from out the core 
Of suffering flowed a secret spring of joy, 
Which mocked the droughts of Fate, and left him 

glad 
And glorying in his sorrow. As I gazed 
He raised his silent flute, and, half ashamed. 
Blew a soft note ; and as I stayed awhile, 
I heard him thus discourse — 

" The flute is sweet 
To gods and men, but sweeter far the lyre 
And voice of a true singer. Shall I fear 



64 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

To tell of that great trial, when I strove 
And Phoebus conquered? Nay, no shame it is 
To bow to an immortal melody ; 
But glory. 

Once among the Phrygian hills 
I lay a-musing, — while the silly sheep 
Wandered among the thyme — upon the bank 
Of a clear mountain stream, beneath the pines, 
Safe hidden from the noon. A dreamy haze 
Played on the uplands, but the hills were clear 
In sunlight, and no cloud was on the sky. 
It was the time when a deep silence comes 
Upon the summer earth, and all the birds 
Have ceased from singing, and the world is still 
As midnight, and if any live thing move — 
Some fur-clad creature, or cool gliding snake — 
Within the pipy overgrowth of weeds. 
The ear can catch the rustle, and the trees 
And earth and air are listening. As I lay, 
Faintly, as in a dream, I seemed to hear 
A tender music, like the y^olian chords, 
Sound low within the woodland, whence the stream. 
Flowed full, yet silent. Long, with ear to ground, 
I hearkened ; and the sweet strain, fuller grown. 
Rounder and clearer came, and danced along 



MAJ?SVAS. 65 

In mirthful measure now, and now grown grave 
In dying falls, and sweeter and more clear, 
Tripping at nuptials and high revelry, 
Wailing at burials, rapt in soaring thoughts. 
Chanting strange sea-tales full of mystery, 
Touching all chords of being, and life and death, 
Now rose, now sank, and always was divine. 
So strange the music came. 

Till, as I lay 
Enraptured, swift a sudden discord rang. 
And all the sound grew still. A sudden flash. 
As from a sunlit jewel, fired the wood. 
A noise of water smitten, and on the hills 
A fair white fleece of cloud, which swiftly climbed 
Into the farthest heaven. Then, as I mused. 
Knowing a parting goddess, straight I saw 
A sudden splendor float upon the stream. 
And knew it for this jewelled flute, which paused 
Before me on an eddy. It I snatched 
Eager, and to my ardent lips I bore 
The wonder, and behold, with the first breath — 
The first warm human breath, the silent strains. 
The half-drowned notes which late the goddess blew. 
Revived, and sounded clearer, sweeter far 
Than mortal skill could make. So with delight 



66 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

I left my flocks to wander o'er the wastes 
Untended, and the wolves and eagles seized 
The tender lambs, but I was for my art — 
Nought else ; and though the high-pitched notes 

divine 
Grew faint, yet something lingered, and at last 
So sweet a note I sounded of my skill, 
That all the Phrygian highlands, all the white 
Hill villages, were fain to hear the strain, 
Which the mad shepherd made. 

So, overbold, 
And rapt in my new art, at last I dared 
To challenge Phoebus' self. 

'Twas a fair day 
When sudden, on the mountain side, I saw 
A train of fleecy clouds in a white band 
Descending. Down the gleaming pinnacles 
And difficult crags they floated, and the arch. 
Drawn with its thousand rays against the sun. 
Hung like a glory o'er them. Midst the pines 
They clothed themselves with form, and straight I 

knew 
The immortals. Young Apollo, with his lyre. 
Kissed by the sun, and all the Muses clad 
In robes of gleaming white ; then a great fear, 



MAA'SVAS. 6y 

Yet mixed with joy, assailed me, for I knew 
Myself a mortal equalled with the gods. 

Ah me ! how fair they were ! how fair and dread 
In face and form, they showed, when now they 

came - 
Upon the thymy slope, and the young god 
Lay with his choir around him, beautiful 
And bold as Youth and Dawn ! There was no 

cloud 
Upon the sky, nor any sound at all 
When I began my strain. No coward fear 
Of what might come restrained me ; but an awe 
Of those immortal eyes and ears diving 
Looking and listening. All the earth seemed full 
Of ears for me alone — the woods, the fields. 
The hills, the skies were listening. Scarce a sound 
My flute might make ; such subtle harmonies 
The silence seemed to weave round me and flout 
The half unuttered thought. Till last I blew. 
As now, a hesitating note, and lo ! 
The breath divine, lingering on mortal lips. 
Hurried my soul along to such fair rhymes, 
Sweeter than wont, that swift I knew my life 
Rise up within me, and expand, and all 



68 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The human, which so nearly is divine, 
Was glorified, and on the Muses' lips, 
And in their lovely eyes, I saw a fair 
Approval, and my soul in me was glad. ' 

For all the strains I blew were strams of love - 
Love striving, love triumphant, love that lies 
Within beloved arms, and wreathes his locks 
With flowers, and lets the world go by and sings 
Unheeding ; and I saw a kindly gleam 
Within the Muses' eyes, who were indeed, 
Women, though god-like. 

But upon the face 
Of the youn§ Sun-god only haughty scorn 
Sate, and he swiftly struck his golden lyre. 
And played the Song of Life ; and lo, I knew 
My strain, how earthy ! Oh, to hear the young 
Apollo playing ! and the hidden cells 
And chambers of the universe displayed 
Before the charmed sound ! 1 seemed to float 
In some enchanted cave, where the wave dips 
In from the sunlit sea, and floods its depths 
With reflex hues of heaven. My soul was rapt' 
By that I heard, and dared to wish no more 
For victory ; and yet because the sound 



MAKSVAS. 69 

Of music that is born of human breath 
Comes straighter from the soul than any strain 
The hand alone can make ; therefore I knew, 
With a mixed thrill of pity and delight, 
The nine immortal Sisters hardly touched 
By this fine strain of music, as by mine. 
And when the high lay trembled to its close, 
Still doubting. 

Then upon the Sun-god's face 
There passed a cold proud smile. He swept his lyre 
Once more, then laid it down, and with clear voice. 
The voice of godhead, sang. Oh, ecstasy. 
Oh happiness of him who once has heard 
Apollo singing ! For his ears the sound 
Of grosser music dies, and all the earth 
Is full of subtle undertones, which change 
The listener and transform him. As he sang — 
Of what I know not, but the music touched 
Each chord of being — I felt my secret life 
Stand open to it, as the parched earth yawns 
To drink the summer rain ; and at the call 
Of those refreshing waters, all my thought 
Stir from its dark and secret depths, and burst 
Into sweet, odorous flowers, and from their wells 
Deep call to deep, and all the mystery 



70 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Of all that is, laid open. As he sang, 

I saw the Nine, with lovely pitying eyes, 

Sign ' He has conquered.' Yet I felt no pang 

Of fear, only deep joy that I had heard 

Such music while I lived, even though it brought 

Torture and death. For what were it to lie 

Sleek, crowned with roses, drinking vulgar praise. 

And surfeited with offerings, the dull gift 

Of ignorant hands — all which I might have 

known — 
To this diviner failure ? Godlike 'tis 
To climb upon the icy ledge, and fall 
Where other footsteps dare not. So I knew 
My fate, and it was near. 

For to a pine 
They bound me willing, and with cruel stripes 
Tore me, and took my life. 

But from my blood 
Was born the stream of song, and on its flow 
My poor flute, to the cool swift river borne, 
Floated, and thence adown a lordlier tide 
Into the deep, wide sea. I do not blame 
Phoebus, or Nature which has set this bar 
Betwixt success and failure, for I know 
How far high failure overleaps the bound 



A/A/^SVAS. 71 

Of low successes. Only suffering draws 

The inner heart of song and can elicit 

The perfumes of the soul. 'Twere not enough 

To fail, for that were happiness to him 

Who ever upward looks with reverent eye 

And seeks but to admire. So, since the race 

Of bards soars highest ; as who seek to show 

Our lives as in a glass ; therefore it comes 

That suffering weds with song, from him of old, 

Who solaced his blank darkness with his verse ; 

Through all the story of neglect and scorn. 

Necessity, sheer hunger, early death. 

Which smite the singer still. Not only those 

Who hold clear accents of the voice divine 

Are honorable — they are blest, indeed, 

Whate'er the world has held — but those who hear 

Some fair faint echoes, though the crowd be deaf. 

And see the white gods' garments on the hills. 

Which the crowd sees not, though they may not find 

Fit music for their visions ; they are blest, ^ 

Not pitiable. Not from arrogant pride 

Nor over boldness fail they who have striven 

To tell what they have heard, with voice too weak 

For such high message. More it is than ease, 

Palace and pomp, honors and luxuries, 



72 THE Eric OF HADES. 

To have seen white Presences upon the hills, 
To have heard the voices of the Eternal Gods." 

So spake he, and I seemed to look on him, 
Whose sad young eyes grow on us from the page 
Of his own verse : who did himself to death : 
Or whom the dullard slew : or whom the sea 
Rapt from us : and I passed without a word. 
Slow, grave, with many musings. 



ANDROMEDA. 73 



Then I came 
On one a maiden, meek with folded hands, 
Seated against a rugged face of cHff, 
In silent thought. Anon she raised her arms, 
Hei^ gleaming arms, above her on the rock, 
With hands which clasped each other, till she showed 
As in a statue, and her white robe fell 
Down from her maiden shoulders, and I knew 
The fair form as it seemed chained to the stone 
By some invisible gyves, and named her name : 
And then she raised her frightened eyes to mine 
As one who, long expecting some great fear, 
Scarce sees deliverance come. But when she saw 
Only a kindly glance, a softer look 
Came in them, and she answered to my thought 
With a sweet voice and low. 

" I did but muse 
Upon the painful past, long dead and done. 
Forgetting I was saved. 

The angry clouds 
Burst always on the low flat plains, and swept 
The harvest to the ocean ; all the land 
Was wasted, A great serpent from the deep. 



74 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Lifting his horrible head above their homes, 
Devoured the children. And the people prayed 
In vain to careless gods. 

On that dear land, 
Which now was turned into a sullen sea, 
Gazing in safety from the stately towers 
Of my sire's palace, I, a princess, saw, • 

Lapt in soft luxury, within my bower, 
The wreck of humble homes come whirling by. 
The drowning, bleating flocks, the bellowing herds, 
The grain scarce husbanded by toiling hands 
Upon the sunlit plain, rush to the sea. 
With floating corpses. On the rain-swept hills 
The remnant of the people huddled close. 
Homeless and starving. All my being was filled 
With pity for them, and I joyed to give 
What food and shelter and compassionate hands 
Of woman might. I took the little ones 
And clasped them shivering to the virgin breast 
Which knew no other touch but theirs, and gave 
Raiment and food. My sire, not stern to me. 
Smiled on me as he saw. My gentle mother. 
Who loved me with a closer love than binds 
A mother to her son ; and sunned herself 
In my fresh beauty, seeing in my young eyes 



ANDROMEDA. 75 

Her own fair vanished youth ; doted on me, 
And fain had kept my eyes from the sad sights 
That pained them. But my heart was sad in me, 
Seeing the ineffable miseries of life, 
And that mysterious anger of the gods, 
And helpless to allay them. All in vain 
Were prayer and supplication, all in vain 
The costly victims steamed. The vengeful clouds 
Hid the fierce sky, and still the ruin came. 
And wallowing his grim length within the flood. 
Over the ravaged fields and homeless homes, 
The dread sea-monster raged, sating his jaws 
With blood and rapine. 

Then to the dread shrine 
Of Ammon went the priests, and reverend chiefs 
Of all the nation. White robed, at their head. 
Went slow my royal sire. The oracle 
Spoke clear, not as ofttimes in words obscure, 
Ambiguous. And as we stood to meet 
The suppliants — she who bare me, with her head 
Upon my neck — we cheerful and with song 
Welcomed their swift return ; auguring well 
From such a quick-sped mission. 

But my sire 
Hid his face from me, and the crowd of priests 



'J 6 THE EPIC OE HADES. 

And nobles looked not at us. And no word 

Was spoken till at last one drew a scroll 

And gave it to the queen, who straightway swooned, 

Having read it, on my breast, and then I saw, 

I the young girl whose soft life scarcely knew 

Shadow of sorrow, I whose heart was full 

Of pity for the rest, what doom was mine. 

I think I hardly knew in that dread hour 
The fear that came anon ; I was transformed 
Into a champion of my race, made strong 
With a new courage, glorying to meet, 
In all the ecstasy of sacrifice. 
Death face to face. Some god, I know not who, 
O'erspread me, and despite my mother's tears 
And my stern father's grief, I met my fate 
Unshrinking. 

When the moon rose clear from cloud 
Once more again over the midnight sea, 
And that vast watery plain, where were before 
Hundreds of happy homes, and well-tilled fields, 
And purple vineyards ; from my father's towers 
The white procession went along the paths. 
The high cliff paths, which well I loved of old, 
Among the myrtles. Priests with censers went 



ANDROMEDA. 7/ 

And offerings, robed in white, and round their brows 

The sacred fillet. With his nobles walked 

My sire with breaking heart. My mother clung 

To me the victim, and the young girls went 

With wailing and with tears. A solemn strain 

The soft flutes sounded, as we went by night 

To a wild headland, rock-based in the sea. 

There on a sea-worn rock, upon the verge. 
To some rude stanchions, high above my head. 
They bound me. Out at sea, a black reef rose. 
Washed by the constant surge, wherein a cave 
Sheltered deep down the monster. The sad queen 
Would scarcely leave me, though the priests shrunk 

back 
In terror. Last, torn from my endless kiss. 
Swooning they bore her upwards. All my robe 
Fell from my lifted arms, and left displayed 
The virgin treasure of my breasts ; and then 
The white procession through the moonlight streamed 
Upwards, and soon their soft flutes sounded low 
Upon the high lawns, leaving me alone. 

There stood I in the moonlight, left alone 
Against the sea-worn rock. Hardly I knew. 



yS THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Seeing only the bright moon and summer sea, 
Which gently heaved and surged, and kissed the ledge 
With smooth warm tides, what fate was mine. I 

seemed, 
Soothed by the quiet, to be resting still 
Within my maiden chamber, and to watch 
The moonlight thro' my lattice, then again 
Fear came, and then the pride of sacrifice 
Filled me, as on the high cliff lawns I heard 
The wailing cries, the chanted liturgies, 
And knew me bound forsaken to the rock, 
And saw the monster-haunted depths of sea. 

So all night long upon the sandy shores 
I heard the hollow murmur of the wave. 
And all night long the hidden sea caves made 
A ghostly echo ; and the sea birds mewed 
Around me ; once I heard a mocking laugh, 
As of some scornful Nereid ; once the waters 
Broke louder on the scarped reefs, and ebbed 
As if the monster coming ; but again 
He came not, and the dead moon sank, and still 
Only upon the cliffs the wails, the chants. 
And I forsaken on my sea-worn rock. 
And lo, the monster-haunted depths of sea. 



ANDROMEDA. 7^ 

Till at the dead dark hour before the dawn, 
When sick men die, and scarcely fear itself 
Bore up my weary eyelids, a great surge 
Burst on the rock, and slowly, as it seemed, 
The sea sucked downward to its depths, laid bare 
The hidden reefs, and then before my eyes — 
Oh, horrible ! a huge and loathsome snake 
Lifted his dreadful crest and scaly side 
Above the wave, in bulk and length so large, 
Coil after hideous coil, that scarce the eye 
Could measure its full horror ; the great jaws 
Dropped as with gore ; the large and furious eyes 
Were fired with blood and lust. Nearer he came, 
And slowly, with a devilish glare, more near, 
Till his hot foetor choked me, and his tongue, 
Forked horribly within his poisonous jaws. 
Played lightning-like around me. For awhile 
I swooned, and when I knew my life again, 
Death's bitterness was past. 

Then with a bound 
Leaped up the hot red sun above the sea, 
And lit the horrid fulgor of his scales. 
And struck upon the rock ; and as I turned 
My head in the last agony of death, 
I knew a brilliant sunbeam swiftly leaping 



8o THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Downward from crag to crag, and felt new hope 
Where all was hopeless. On the hills a shout 
Of joy, and on the rocks the ring of mail ; 
And while the hungry serpent's gloating eyes 
Were fixed on me, a knight in casque of gold 
And blazing shield, who with his flashing blade 
Fell on the monster. Long the conflict raged, 
Till all the rocks were red with blood and slime, 
And yet my champion from those horrible jaws 
And dreadful coils was scatheless. Zeus his sire 
Protected, and the awful shield he bore 
Withered the monster's life and left him cold, 
Dragging his helpless length and grovelHng crest : 
And o'er his glaring eyes the films of death 
Crept, and his writhing flank and hiss of hate 
The great deep swallowed down, and blood and 

spume 
Rose on the waves ; and a strange wailing cry 
Resounded o'er the waters, and the sea 
Bellowed within its hollow-sounding caves. 

Then knew I, I was saved, and with me all 
The people. From my wrists he loosed the gyves. 
My hero ; and within his godlike arms 
Bore me by slippery rock and diflicult path, 



ANDROMEDA. 8l 

To where my mother prayed. There was no need 
To ask my love. Without a spoken word 
Love lit his fires within me. My young heart 
Went forth, Love calling, and I gave him all. 

Dost thou then wonder that the memory 
Of this supreme brief moment lingers still. 
While all the happy uneventful years 
Of wedded life, and all the fair young growth 
Of offspring, and the tranquil later joys, 
Nay, even the fierce eventful fight which raged 
When we were wedded, fade and are deceased, 
Lost in the irrecoverable past ? 
Nay, 'tis not strange. Always the memory 
Of overwhelming perils or great joys 
Avoided or enjoyed, writes its own trace, 
With such deep characters upon our lives, 
That all the rest are blotted. In this place, 
Where is not action, thought, or count of time, 
It is not weary as it were on earth, 
To dwell on these old memorie*. Time is born 
Of dawns and sunsets, days that wax and wane 
And stamp themselves upon the yielding face 
Of fleeting human life ; but here there is 
Morning nor evening, act nor suffering, 



82 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

But only one unchanging Present holds 

Our being suspended. One blest day indeed, 

Or centuries ago or yesterday, 

There came among us one who was Divine, 

Not as our gods, joyous and breathing strength 

And careless life, but crowned with a new crown 

Of suffering, and a great light came with him. 

And with him he brought Time and a new sense 

Of dim, long-vanished years; and since he passed 

I seem to see new meaning in my fate, 

And all the deeds I tell of. Evermore 

The young life comes, bound to the cruel rocks 

Alone. Before it the unfathomed sea 

Smiles, filled with monstrous growths that wait to 

take 
Its innocence. Far off the voice and hand 
Of love kneel by in agony, and entreat 
The seeming careless gods. Still when the deep 
Is smoothest, lo, the deadly fangs and coils 
Lurk near, to smite with death. And o'er the crags 
Of duty, like a sudden sunbeam, springs 
Some golden soul half mortal, half divine, 
Heaven-sent, and breaks the chain ; and evermore 
For sacrifice they die, through sacrifice 
They live, and are for others, and no grief 



ANDROMEDA. 83 

Which smites the humblest but reverberates 
Thro' all the close-set files of life, and takes 
The princely soul that from its royal towers 
Looks down and sees the sorrow. 

Sir, farewell ! 
If thou shouldst meet my children on the earth 
Or here, for maybe it is long ago 
Since I and they were living, say to them 
I only muse a little here, and wait 
The waking." 

And her lifted arms sank down 
Upon her knees, and as I passed I saw her 
Gazing with soft rapt eyes, and on her lips 
A smile as of a saint. 



84 THE EPIC OF HADES. 



And then I saw 
A manly hunter pace along the lea, 
His bow upon his shoulder, and his spear 
Poised idly in his hand : the face and form 
Of vigorous youth ; but in the full brown eyes 
A timorous gaze as of a hunted hart, 
Brute-like, yet human still, even as the Faun 
Of old, the dumb brute passing into man, 
And dowered with double nature. As he came 
I seemed to question of his fate, and he 
Answered me thus : 

" 'Twas one hot afternoon 
That I, a hunter, wearied with my day. 
Heard my hounds baying fainter on the hills. 
Led by the flying hart ; and when the sound 
Faded and all was still, I turned to seek, 
O'ercome by heat and thirst, a little glade. 
Beloved of old, where, in the shadowy wood. 
The clear cold crystal of a mossy pool 
Lipped the soft emerald marge, and gave again 
The flower-starred lawn where ofttimes overspent 
I lay upon the grass and careless bathed 



ACTAlON. 85 

My limbs in the sweet lymph. 

But as I neared 
The hollow, sudden through the leaves I saw 
A throng of wood-nymphs fair, sporting undraped 
Round one, a goddess. She with timid hand 
Loosened her zone, and glancing round let fall 
Her robe from neck and bosom, pure and bright, 
(For it was Dian's self I saw, none else) 
As when she frees her from a fleece of cloud 
And swims along the deep blue sea of heaven 
On sweet June nights. Silent awhile I stood. 
Rooted with awe, and fain had turned to fly, 
But feared by careless footstep to affright 
Those chaste cold eyes. Great awe and reverence 
Held me, and fear ; then Love with passing wing 
Fanned me, and held my eyes, and checked my 

breath. 
Signing ' Beware ! ' 

So for a time I watched, 
Breathless as one a brooding nightmare holds, 
Who fleeth some great fear, yet fleeth not; 
Till the last flutter of lawn, and veil no more 
Obscured, and all the beauty of my dreams 
Assailed my sense. But ere I raised my eyes, 
As one who fain would look and see the sun. 



86 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The first glance dazed my brain. Only I knew 
The perfect outline flow in tender curves, 
To break in doubled charms ; only a haze 
Of creamy white, dimple, and deep divine : 
And then no more. For lo ! a sudden chill, 
And such thick mist as shuts the hills at eve. 
Oppressed me gazing ; and a heaven-sent shame. 
An awe, a fear, a reverence for the unknown. 
Froze all the springs of will and left me cold, 
And blinded all the longings of my eyes, ' 

Leaving such dim reflection still as mocks 
Him who has looked on a great light, and keeps 
On his closed eyes the image. Presently, 
My fainting soul, safe hidden for awhile 
Deep in Life's mystic shades, renewed herself, 
And straight, the innocent brute within the man 
Bore on me, and with half-averted eye 
I gazed upon the secret. 

As I looked, 
A radiance, white as beamed the frosty moon 
On the mad boy and slew him, beamed on me ; 
Made chill my pulses, checked my life and heat ; 
Transformed me, withered all my soul, and left 
My being burnt out. For lo ! the dreadful eyes 
Of Godhead met my gaze, and through the mask 



ACTION. 87 

And thick disguise of sense, as througli a wood, 

Pierced to my life. Then suddenly I knew 

An altered nature, touched by no desire 

For that which showed so lovely, but declined 

To lower levels. Nought of fear or awe. 

Nothing of love was mine. Wide-eyed I gazed. 

But saw no spiritual beam to blight 

My brain with too much beauty, no undraped 

And awful majesty ; only a brute, 

Dumb charm, like that which draws the brute to it, 

Unknowing it is drawn. So gradually 

I knew a dull content o'ercloud my sense. 

And unabashed I gazed, like that dumb bird 

Which thinks no thought and speaks no word, yet 

fronts 
The sun that blinded Homer — all my fear 
Sunk with my shame, in a base happiness. 

But as I gazed, and careless turned and passed 
Through the thick wood, forgetting what had been, 
And thinking thoughts no longer, swift there came 
A mortal terror : voices that I knew, 
My own hounds' bayings that I loved before. 
As with them often o'er the purple hills 
I chased the flying hart from slope to slope. 



88 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Before the slow sun climbed the Eastern peaks, 
Until the swift sun smote the Western plain ; 
Whom often I had cheered by voice and glance, 
Whom often I had checked with hand and thong ; 
Grim followers, like the passions, firing me ; 
True servants, like the strong nerves, urging me 
On many a fruitless chase, to find and take 
Some too swift-fleeting beauty ; faithful feet 
And tongues, obedient always : these I knew. 
Clothed with a new-born force and vaster grown, 
And stronger than their master ; and I thought. 
What if they tare me with their jaws, nor knew 
That once I ruled them, — brute pursuing brute, 
And I the quarry? Then I turned and fled, — 
If it was I indeed that feared and fled — 
Down the long glades, and thro' the tangled brakes, 
Where scarce the sunlight pierced ; fled on and on, 
And panted, self-pursued. But evermore 
The dissonant music which I knew so sweet, 
When by the windy hills, the echoing vales. 
And whispering pines it rang; now far, now near, 
As from my rushing steed I leant and cheered 
With voice and horn the chase, this brought to me 
Fear of I knew not what, which bade me fly. 
Fly always, fly ; but when my heart stood still, 



ACTION. 89 

And all my limbs were stiffened as I fled, 

Just as the white moon ghost-like climbed the sky. 

Nearer they came and nearer, baying loud, 

With bloodshot eyes and red jaws dripping foam ; 

And when I strove to check their savagery, 

Speaking with words ; no voice articulate came. 

Only a dumb, low bleat. Then all the throng 

Leapt swift on me, and tare me as I lay, 

And left me man again. 

Wherefore I walk 
Along these dim fields peopled with the ghosts 
Of heroes who have left the ways of earth 
For this faint ghost of them. Sometimes I think, 
Pondering on what has been, that all my days 
Were shadows, all my life an allegory ; 
And, though I know sometimes some fainter gleam 
Of the old beauty move me, and sometimes 
Some beat of the old pulses ; that my fate. 
For ever hurrying on in hot pursuit, 
To fall at length self-slain, was but a talc 
Writ large by Zeus upon a mortal life. 
Writ large, and yet a riddle. For sometimes 
I read its meaning thus : Life is a chase. 
And Man the hunter, always following on. 
With hounds of rushing thought or fiery sense. 



go THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Some hidden truth or beauty, fleeting still 

For ever through the thick-leaved coverts deep 

And wind-worn wolds of time. And if he turn 

A moment from the hot pursuit to seize 

Some chance-brought sweetness, other than the 

search 
To which his soul is set, — some dalliance, 
Some outward shape of Art, some lower love. 
Some charm of wealth and sleek content and 

home, — 
Then, if he check an instant, the swift chase 
Of fierce untempered energies which pursue, 
With jaws unsated and athirst for life, 
Bears down on him relentless, and o'erwhelms 
His prize and him in ruin. 

And sometimes 
I seem to myself a thinker, who at last. 
Amid the chase and capture of low ends. 
Pausing by some cold well of hidden thought 
Comes on some perfect truth, and looks and looks 
Till the fair vision blinds him. And the sum 
Of all his lower self pursuing him. 
The strong brute forces, the unchecked desires. 
Finding him bound and speechless, deem him now 
No more their master, but some soulless thing ; 



ACTy^OiV. 91 

And leap on him, and seize him, and possess 
His life, till through death's gate he pass to life, 
And, his own ghost, revives. But looks no more 
Upon the truth unveiled, but through a cloud 
Of creed and faith and longing, which shall change 
One day to perfect knowledge. 

But whoe'er 
Shall read the riddle of my life, I walk 
In this dim land amid dim ghosts of kings, 
As one day thou shalt; meantime, fare thou well." 



92 THE EPIC OF HADES. 



Then passed he ; and I marked hhii slowly go 
Along the winding ways of that weird land, 
And vanish in a wood. 



And next I knew 
A woman perfect as a young man's dream, 
And breathing as it seemed the old sweet air 
Of the fair days of old, when man was young 
And life an Epic. Round the lips a smile 
Subtle and deep and sweet as hers who looks 
From the old painter's canvas, and derides 
Life and the riddle of things, the aimless strife, 
The folly of Love, as who has proved it all, 
Enjoyed and suffered. In the lovely eyes 
A weary look, no other than the gaze 
Which ofttimes as the rapid chariot whirls. 
And ofttimes by the glaring midnight streets, 
Gleams out and chills our thought. And yet not 

guilt 
Nor sorrow was it ; only weariness, 
No more, and still most lovely. As I named 



HELEN. 93 

Her name in haste, she looked with half surprise, 
And thus she seemed to speak. 

" What ? Dost thou know, 
Thou too, the fatal glances which beguiled 
Those strong rude chiefs of old? Has not the 

gloom 
Of this dim land withdrawn from out mine eyes 
The glamour which once filled them ? Does my 

cheek 
Retain the round of youth and still defy 
The wear of immemorial centuries ? 
And this low voice, long silent, keeps it still 
The music of old time ? Aye, in thine eyes 
I read it, and within thine eyes I see 
Thou knowest me, and the story of my life 
Sung by the blind old bard when I was dead. 
And all my lovers dust. I know thee not. 
Thee nor thy gods, yet would I soothly swear 
I was not all to blame for what has been, 
The long fight, the swift death, the woes, the tears. 
The brave lives spent, the humble homes uptorn 
To gain one poor fair face. It was not I 
That curved these lips into this subtle smile. 
Or gave these eyes their fire, nor yet made round 
This supple frame. It was not I, but Love, 



94 'J^^E EPIC OF HADES. 

Love mirroring himself in all things fair, 
Love that projects himself upon a life, 
And dotes on his own image. 

Ah ! the days, 
The weary years of Love and feasts and gold, 
The hurried flights, the din of clattering hoofs 
At midnight, when the heroes dared for me, 
And bore me o'er the hills ; the swift pursuits 
Baffled and lost ; or when from isle to isle 
The high-oared galley spread its wings and rose 
Over the swelling surges, and I saw. 
Time after time, the scarce familiar town, 
The sharp-cut hills, the well-loved palaces. 
The gleaming temples fade, and all for me. 
Me the dead prize, the shell, the soulless ghost, 
The husk of a true woman -; the fond words 
Wasted on careless ears, that seemed to hear, 
Of love to me unloving ; the rich feasts. 
The silken dalliance and soft luxury, 
The fair observance and high reverence 
For me who cared not, to whatever land 
My kingly lover snatched me. I have known 
How small a fence Love sets between the king 
And the strong hind, who breeds his brood, and dies 
Upon the field he tills. I have exchanged 



HELEN. 95 

People for people, crown for glittering crown, 
Through every change a queen, and held my state 
Hateful, and sickened in my soul to lie 
Stretched on soft cushions to the lutes' low sound, 
While on the wasted fields the clang of arms 
Rang, and the foemen perished, and swift death, 
Hunger, and plague, and every phase of woe 
Vexed all the land for me. I have heard the curse 
Unspoken, when the wife widowed for me 
Clasped to her heart her orphans starved for me ; 
As I swept proudly by. I have prayed the gods, 
Hating my own fair face which wrought such woe, 
Some plague divine might light on it and leave 
My curse a ruin. Yet I think indeed 
They had not cursed but pitied, those true wives 
Who mourned their humble lords, and straining felt 
The innocent thrill which swells the mother's heart 
Who clasps her growing boy ; had they but known 
The lifeless life, the pain of hypocrite smiles, 
The dead load of caresses simulated, 
When Love stands shuddering by to see his fires 
Lit for the shrine of gold. What if they felt 
The weariness of loveless love which grew 
And through the jealous palace portals seized 
The caged unloving woman, sick of toys, 



96 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Sick of her gilded chains, her ease, herself, 

Till for sheer weariness she flew to meet 

Some new unloved seducer ? What if they knew 

No childish loving hands, or worse than all. 

Had borne them sullen to a sire unloved, 

And left them without pain ? I might have been, 

I too, a loving mother and chaste wife, 

Had Fate so willed. 

For I remember well 
How one day straying from my father's halls 
Seeking anemones and violets, 

A girl in Spring-time, when the heart makes Spring 
Within the budding bosom, that I came 
Of a sudden through a wood upon a bay, 
A little sunny land-locked bay, whose banks 
Sloped gently downward to the yellow sand. 
Where the blue wave creamed soft with fairy foam 
And oft the Nereids sported. As I strayed 
Singing, with fresh-pulled violets in my hair 
And bosom, and my hands were full of flowers, 
I came upon a little milk-white lamb, 
And took it in my arms and fondled it, 
And wreathed its neck with flowers, and sang to it 
And kissed it, and the Spring was in my life, 
And I was glad. 



HELEN. 97 

And when I raised my eyes, 
Behold, a youthful shepherd with his crook 
Stood by me and regarded as I lay, 
Tall, fair, with clustering curls, and front that wore 
A budding manhood. As I looked a fear 
Came o'er me, lest he were some youthful god 
Disguised in shape of man, so fair he was ; 
But when he spoke, the kindly face was full 
Of manhood, and the large eyes full of fire 
Drew me without a word, and all the flowers 
Fell from me, and the little milk-white lamb 
Strayed through the brake, and took with it the 

white 
Fair years of childhood. Time fulfilled my being 
With passion like a cup, and with one kiss 
Left me a woman. 

Ah ! the lovely days, 
When on the warm bank crowned with flowerswe sate 
And thought no harm, and his thin reed pipe made 
Low music, and no witness of our love 
Intruded, but the tinkle of the flock 
Came from the hill, and 'neath the odorous shade 
We dreamed away the day, and watched the waves 
Steal shoreward, and beyond the sylvan capes 
The innumerable laughter of the sea ! 



98 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Ah youth and love ! So passed the happy days 
Till twilight, and I stole as in a dream 
Homeward, and lived as in a happy dream. 
And when they spoke answered as in a dream, 
And through the darkness saw, as in a glass. 
The happy, happy day, and thrilled and glowed 
And kept my love in sleep, and longed for dawn, 
And scarcely stayed for hunger, and with morn 
Stole eager to the little wood, and fed 
My life with kisses. Ah ! the joyous days 
Of innocence, when Love was Queen in heaven, 
And nature unreproved ! Break they then still, 
Those azure circles, on a golden shore ? 
Smiles there no glade upon the older earth 
Where spite of all, gray wisdom, and new gods, 
Young lovers dream within each other's arms 
Silent, by shadowy grove, or sunlit sea? 

Ah days too fair to last ! There came a night 
When I lay longing for my love, and knew 
Sudden the clang of hoofs, the broken doors, 
The clash of swords, the shouts, the groans, the stain 
Of red upon the marble, the fixed gaze 
Of dead and dying eyes, — that was the time 
When first I looked on death, — and when I woke 



HELEN. 99 

From my deep swoon, I felt the night air cool 
Upon my brow, and the cold stars look down, 
As swift we galloped o'er the darkling plain ; 
And saw the chill sea glimpses slowly wake, 
With arms unknown around me. When the dawn 
Broke swift, we panted on the pathless steeps, 
And so by plain and mountain till we came 
To Athens, where they kept me till I grew 
Fairer with every year, and many wooed. 
Heroes and chieftains, but I loved not one. 

And then the avengers came and snatched me 
back 
To Sparta. All the dark high-crested chiefs 
Of Argos wooed me, striving king with king 
For one fair foolish face, nor knew I kept 
No heart to give them. Yet since I was grown 
Weary of honeyed words and suit of love, 
I wedded a brave chief, dauntless and true. 
But what cared I ? I could not prize at all 
His honest service. I had grown so tired 
Of loving and of love, that when they brought 
News that the fairest shepherd on the hills, 
Having done himself to death for his lost love, 
Lay, like a lovely statue, cold and white 



100 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Upon the golden sand, I hardly knew 

More than a passing pang. Love, like a flower, 

Love, springing up too tall in a young breast. 

The growth of morning, Life's too scorching sun 

Had withered long ere noon. Love, like a flame 

On his own altar offering up my heart. 

Had burnt my being to ashes. 

Was it love 
That drew me then to Paris ? He was fair, 
I grant you, fairer than a summer morn, 
Fair with a woman's fairness, yet in arms 
A hero, but he never had my heart. 
Not love for him allured me, but the thirst 
For freedom, if in more than thought I erred, 
And was not rapt but willing. For my child, 
Born to an unloved father, loved me not, 
The fresh sea called, the galleys plunged, and I 
Fled willing from my prison and the pain 
Of undesired caresses, and the wind 
Was fair, and on the third day as we sailed, 
My heart was glad within me when I saw 
The towers of Ilium rise beyond the wave. 

Ah, the long years, the melancholy years, 
The miserable melancholy years ! 



HELEN. 101 

For soon the new grew old, and then I grew 
Weary of him, of all, of pomp and state 
And novel splendor. Yet at times I knew 
Some thrill of pride within me as I saw 
From those high walls, a prisoner and a foe, 
The swift ships flock at anchor in the bay, 
The hasty landing and the flash of arms, 
The lines of royal tents upon the plain. 
The close-shut gates, the chivalry within 
Issuing in all its pride to meet the shock 
Of the bold chiefs without ; so year by year 
The haughty challenge from the warring hosts 
Rang forth, and I with a divided heart 
Saw victory incline, now here, now there, 
And helpless marked the Argive chiefs I knew, 
The spouse I left, the princely loves of old, 
Now with each other strive, and now with Troy : 
The brave pomp of the morn, the fair strong limbs. 
The glittering panoply, the bold young hearts, 
Athirst for fame of war, and with the night 
The broken spear, the shattered helm, the plume 
Dyed red with blood, the ghastly dying face. 
And nerveless limbs laid lifeless. And I knew 
The stainless Hector whom I could have loved. 
But that a happy love made blind his eyes 



I02 THE EPIC OE HADES. 

To all my baleful beauty ; fallen and dragged 

His noble, manly head upon the sand 

By young Achilles' chariot ; him in turn 

Fallen and slain ; my fair false Paris slain ; 

Plague, famine, battle, raging now within. 

And now without, for many a weary year. 

Summer and winter, till I loathed to live. 

Who was indeed, as well they said, the Hell 

Of men, and fleets, and cities. As I stood 

Upon the walls, ofttimes a longing came. 

Looking on rage, and fight, and blood, and death, 

To end it all, and dash me down and die; 

But no god helped me. Nay, one day I mind 

I would entreat them. ' Pray you, lords, be men. 

What fatal charm is this which Atd gives 

To one poor foolish face ? Be strong, and turn 

In peace, forget this glamour, get you home 

With all your fleets and armies, to the land 

I love no longer, where your faithful wives 

Pine widowed of their lords, and your young boys 

Grow wild to manhood. I have nought to give, 

No heart, nor prize of love for any man, 

Nor recompense. I am the ghost alone 

Of the fair girl ye knew ; she still abides, 

If she still lives and is not wholly dead, 



HELEN. 103 

Stretched on a flowery bank upon the sea 
In fair heroic Argos. Leave this form 
That is no other than the outward shell 
Of a once loving woman.' 

As I spake, 
My pity fired my eyes and flushed my cheek 
With some soft charm ; and as I spread my hands, 
The purple, glancing down a little, left 
The marble of my breasts and one pink bud 
Upon the gleaming snows. And as I looked 
With a mixed pride and terror, I beheld 
The brute rise up within them, and my words 
Fall barren on them. So I sat apart, 
Nor ever more looked forth, while every day 
Brought its own woe. 

The melancholy years. 
The miserable melancholy years. 
Crept onward till the midnight terror came, 
And by the glare of burning streets I saw 
Palace and temple reel in ruin and fall, 
And the long-baffled legions, bursting in 
By gate and bastion, blunted sword and spear 
With unresisted slaughter. From my tower 
I saw the good old king ; his kindly eyes 
In agony, and all his reverend hairs 



I04 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Dabbled with blood, as the fierce foeman thrust 
And stabbed him as he lay ; the youths, the girls, 
Whom day by day I knew, their silken ease 
And royal luxury changed for blood and tears, 
Haled forth to death or worse. Then a great 

hate 
Of life and fate seized on me, and I rose 
And rushed among them, crying, ' See, 'tis I, 
I who have brought this evil ! Kill me ! kill 
The fury that is I, yet is not I ! 
And let my soul go outward through the wound 
Made clean by blood to Hades ! Let me die. 
Not these who did no wrong ! ' But not a hand 
Was raised, and all shrank backward as afraid, 
As from a goddess. Then I swooned and fell 
And knew no more, and when I woke I felt 
My husband's arms around me, and the wind 
Blew fair for Greece, and the beaked galley plunged ; 
And where the towers of Ilium rose of old, 
A pall of smoke above a glare of fire. 

What then in the near future ? 

Ten long years 
Bring youth and love to that deep summer-tide 
When the full noisy current of our lives 



HELEN. 105 

Creeps dumb through wealth of flowers. I think I 

knew 
Somewhat of peace at last, with my good Lord 
Who loved too much to palter with the past, 
Flushed with the present. Young Hermione 
Had grown from child to woman. She was wed ; 
And was not I her mother ? At the pomp 
Of solemn nuptials and requited love, 
I prayed she might be happy, happier far 
Than ever I was ; so in tranquil ease 
I lived a queen long time, and because wealth 
And high observance can make sweet our days 
When youth's swift joy is past, I did requite 
With what I might, not love, the kindly care 
Of him I loved not ; pomps and robes of price 
And chariots held me. But when Fate cut short 
His life and love, his sons who were not mine 
Reigned in his stead, and hated me and mine : 
And knowing I was friendless, I sailed forth 
Once more across the sea, seeking for rest 
And shelter. Still I knew that in my eyes 
Love dwelt, and all the baleful charm of old 
Burned as of yore, scarce dimmed as yet by time : 
I saw it in the mirror of the sea, 
I saw it in the youthful seamen's eyes, 



Io6 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And was half proud again I had such power 
Who now kept nothing else. So one calm eve, 
Behold, a sweet fair isle blushed like a rose 
Upon the summer sea : there my swift ship 
Cast anchor, and they told me it was Rhodes. 

There, in a little wood above the sea, 
Like that dear wood of yore, I wandered forth 
Forlorn, and all my seamen were apart. 
And I, alone ; when at the close of day 
I knew myself surrounded by strange churls 
With angry eyes, and one who ordered them, 
A woman, whom I knew not, but who walked 
In mien and garb a queen. She, with the fire 
Of hate within her eyes, ' Quick, bind her, men ! 
I know her ; bind her fast ! ' Then to the trunk 
Of a tall plane they bound me with rude cords 
That cut my arms. And meantime, far below. 
The sun was gilding fair with dying rays 
Isle after isle and purple wastes of sea. 

And then she signed to them, and all withdrew 
Among the woods and left us, face to face. 
Two women. Ere I spoke, ' I know,' she said, 
' I know that evil fairness. This it was. 



HELEN. 107 

Or ever he had come across my life, 

That made him cold to me, who had my love 

And left me half a heart. If all my life 

Of wedlock was but half a life, what fiend 

Came 'twixt my love and me, but that fair face ? 

What left his children orphans, but that face ? 

And me a widow ? Fiend ! I have thee now ; 

Thou hast not long to live. I will requite 

Thy murders ; yet, oh fiend ! that art so fair. 

Were it not haply better to deface 

Thy fatal loveliness, and leave thee bare 

Of all thy baleful power ? And yet I doubt, 

And looking on thy face I doubt the more. 

Lest all thy dower of fairness be the gift 

Of Aphroditd, and I fear to fight 

Against the immortal Gods.' 

Even with the word, 
And she relenting, all the riddle of life 
Flashed through me, and the inextricable coil 
Of Being, and the immeasurable depths 
And irony of Fate, burst on my thought 
And left me smiling in the eyes of death. 
With this deep smile thou seest. Then with a 
shriek 



I08 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The woman leapt on me, and with bhnd rage 
Strangled my life. And when she had done the deed 
She swooned, and those her followers hasting back 
Fell prone upon their knees before the corpse 
As to a goddess. Then one went and brought 
A sculptor, and within a jewelled shrine 
They set me in white marble, bound to a tree 
Of marble. And they came and knelt to me, 
Young men and maidens, through the secular years. 
While the old gods bore sway, but I was here, 
And now they kneel no longer, for the world 
Has gone from beauty. 

But I think, indeed. 
They well might worship still, for never yet 
Was any thought or thing of beauty born 
Except with suffering. That poor wretch who 

thought 
I injured her, stealing the foolish heart 
Which she prized but I could not, what knew she 
Of that I suffered .? She had loved her love, 
Though unrequited, and had borne to him 
Children who loved her. What if she had been 
Loved yet unloving : all the fire of love 
Burnt out before love's time in one brief blaze 
Of passion. Ah, poor fool ! I pity her. 



HELEN. 109 

Being blest and yet unthankful, and forgive, 

Now that she is a ghost as I, the hand 

Which loosed my load of life. For scarce indeed 

Could any god who cares for mortal men 

Have ever kept me happy. I had tired 

Of simple loving, doubtless, as I tired 

Of splendor and being loved. There be some souls 

For which love is enough, content to bear 

From youth to age, from chestnut locks to gray, 

The load of common, uneventful life 

And penury. But I was not of these ; 

I know not now, if it were best indeed 

That I had reared my simple shepherd brood, 

And lived and died unknown in some poor hut 

Among the Argive hills ; or lived a queen 

As I did, knowing every day that dawned 

Some high emprise and glorious, and in death 

To fill the world with song. Not the same meed 

The gods mete out for all, or She, the dread 

Necessity, who rules both gods and men. 

Some to dishonor, some to honor moulds. 

To happiness some, some to unhappiness. 

We are what Zeus has made us, discords playing 

In the great music, but the harmony 

Is sweeter for them, and the great spheres ring 



no THE EPIC OF HADES. 

In one accordant hymn. 

But thou, if e'er 
There come a daughter of thy love, oh pray 
To all thy gods, lest haply they should mar 
Her life with too great beauty ! " 

So she ceased, 
The fairest woman that the poet's dream 
Or artist hand has fashioned. All the gloom 
Seemed lightened round her, and I heard the sound 
Of her melodious voice when all was still, 
And the dim twilight took her. 



Next there came 
Two who together walked : one with a lyre 
Of gold, which gave no sound ; the other hung 
Upon his breast, and closely clung to him. 
Spent in a tender longing. As they came, 
I heard her gentle voice recounting o'er 
Some ancient tale, and these the words she said : 

" Dear voice and lyre now silent, which I heard 
Across yon sullen river, bringing to me 
All my old life, and he, the ferryman. 
Heard and obeyed, and the grim monster heard 



EURYDICE. Ill 

And fawned on you. Joyous thou cam'st and free 
Like a white sunbeam from the dear bright earth, 
Where suns shone clear, and moons beamed bright, 

and streams 
Laughed with a ripphng music, — nor as here 
The dumb stream stole, the veiled sky slept, the 

fields 
Were lost in twilight. Like a morning breeze. 
Which blows in summer from the gates of dawn 
Across the fields of spice, and wakes to life 
Their slumbering perfume, through this silent land 
Of whispering voices and of half-closed eyes. 
Where scarce a footstep sounds, nor any strain 
Of earthly song, thou cam'st ; and suddenly 
The pale cheeks flushed a little, the murmured words 
Rose to a faint, thin treble ; the throng of ghosts 
Pacing along the sunless ways and still, 
Felt a new life. Thou camest, dear, and straight 
The dull cold river broke in sparkling foam, 
The pale and scentless flowers grew perfumed ; last 
To the dim chamber, wnere with the sad queen 
I sat in gloom, and silently inwove 
Dead wreaths of arharanths ; thy music came 
Laden with life, and I, who seemed to know 
Not life's voice only, but my own, rose up, 



112 THE Eric OF HADES. 

Along the hollow pathways following 

The sound which brought back earth and life and 

love, 
And memory and longing. Yet I went 
With half-reluctant footsteps, as of one 
Whom passion draws, or some high fantasy, 
Despite himself, because some subtle spell, 
Part born of dread to cross that sullen stream 
And its grim guardians, part of secret shame 
Of the young airs and freshness of the earth, 
Being that I was, enchained me. 

Then at last, 
From voice and lyre so high a strain arose 
As trembled on the utter verge of being. 
And thrilling, poured out life. Thus closelier drawn 
I walked with thee, shut in by halcyon sound 
And soft environments of harmony, 
Beyond the ghostly gates, beyond the dim 
Calm fields, where the beetle hummed and the pale 

owl 
Stole noiseless from the copse, and the white blooms 
Stretched thin for lack of sun : so fair a light 
Born out of consonant sound environed me. 
Nor looked I backward, as we seemed to move 
To some high goal of thought and life and love, 



EUR YD ICE. 113 

Like twin birds flying fast with equal wing 

Out of the night, to meet the coming sun 

Above a sea. But on thy dear fair eyes, 

The eyes that well I knew on the old earth, 

I looked not, for with still averted gaze 

Thou ieddest, and I followed ; for, indeed. 

While that high strain was sounding, I was rapt 

In faith and a high courage, driving out 

All doubt and discontent and womanish fear, 

Nay, even my love itself. But when awhile 

It sank a little, or seemed to sink and fall 

To lower levels, seeing that use makes blunt 

The too accustomed ear, straightway, desire 

To look once more on thy recovered eyes 

Seized me, and oft I called with piteous voice, 

Beseeching thee to turn. But thou long time 

Wert even as one unmindful, with grave sign 

And waving hand, denying. Finally, 

When now we neared the stream, on whose far shore 

Lay life, great terror took me, and I shrieked 

Thy name, as in despair. Then thou, as one 

Who knows him set in some great jeopardy, 

A swift death fronting him on either hand. 

Didst slowly turning gaze ; and lo ! I saw 

Thine eyes grown awful, life that looked on death, 



114 THE EPIC OF HADES. 



Clear purity on dark and cankered sin, 

The immortal on corruption, — not the eyes 

That erst I knew in life, but dreadfuller, 

And stranger. As I looked, I seemed to swoon, 

Some blind force whirled me back, and when I woke 

I saw thee vanish in the middle stream, 

A speck on the dull waters, taking with thee 

My life, and leaving Love with me. But I 

Not for myself bewail, but all for thee, 

Who, but for me, wert now among the stars 

With thy great Lord ; I sitting at thy feet : 

But now the fierce and unrestrained rout 

Of passions woman-natured, finding thee 

Scornful of love within thy lonely cell. 

With blind rage falling on thee, tore thy limbs, 

And left them to the Muses' sepulture. 

While thy soul dwells in Hades. But I wail 

My weakness always, who for Love destroyed 

The life that was my Love. I prithee, dear. 

Forgive me if thou canst, who hast lost heaven 

To save a loving woman." 

He with voice 
Sweeter than any mortal melody. 
And plaintive as the music that is made 
By the y^olian strings, or the sad bird 



ORPHEUS. 115 

That sings of summer nights : 

" Eurydice, 
Dear love, be comforted ; not once alone 
That which thou mourncst is, but day by day 
Some lonely soul, which walks apart and feeds 
On high hill pastures, far from herds of men, 
Comes to the low fat fields, and sunny vales 
Joyous with fruits and flowers, and the white arms 
Of laughing love ; and there awhile he stays, 
Content, forgetting all the joys he knew. 
When first the morning broke upon the hills. 
And the keen air breathed from the Eastern gates 
Like a pure draught of wine ; forgetting all 
The strains which float, as from a nearer heaven, 
To him who treads at dawn the untrodden snows. 
While all the warm world sleeps ; — forgetting these 
And all things that have been. And if he gain 
To raise to his own heights the simpler souls 
That dwell upon the plains, the untutored thought, 
The museless lives, the unawakened brain 
That yet might soar, then is he blest indeed. 
But if he fail, then, leaving love behind. 
The wider love of the race, the closer love 
Of some congenial soul, he turns again 
To the old difficult steeps, and there alone 



Il6 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Pines, till the widowed passions of his heart 
Tear him and rend his soul, and drive him down 
To the low plains he left. And there he dwells, 
Missing the sky, dear, and the white peaks, 
And the light air of old ; but in their stead 
Finding the soft sweet sun of the vale, the clouds 
Which veil the heavens indeed, but give the rains 
That ffeed the streams of life and make earth green. 
And bring at last the harvest. So I walk 
In this dim land content with thee, O Love, 
Untouched by any yearning of regret 
For those old days ; nor that the lyre which made 
Erewhile such potent music now is dumb ; 
Nor that the voice that once could move the earth 
(Zeus speaking through it), speaks in household words 
Of homely love : Love is enough for me 
With thee, O dearest ; and perchance at last, 
Zeus willing, this dumb lyre and whispered voice 
Shall wake, by Love inspired, to such clear note 
As soars above the stars, and swelling, lifts 
Our souls to highest heaven." 

Then he stooped, 
And, folded in one long embrace, they went 
And faded. And I cried, " Oh, strong God, Love, 
Misfhtier than Death and Hell ! " 



DEIANEIRA. WJ 



And then I chanced 
On a fair woman, whose sad eyes were full 
Of a fixed self-reproach, like his who knows 
Himself the fountain of his grief, and pines 
In self-inflicted sorrow. As I spake 
Enquiring of her grief, she answered thus : 

" Stranger, thou seest of all the shades below 
The most unhappy. Others sought their love 
In death, and found it, dying ; but for me 
The death that took me, took from me my love, 
And left me comfortless. No load I bear 
Like those dark wicked women, who have slain 
Their Lords for lust or anger, whom the dread 
Propitious Ones within the pit below 
Punish and purge of sin ; only unfaith. 
If haply want of faith be not a crime 
Blacker than murder, when we fail to trust 
One worthy of all faith, and folly bring 
No harder recompense than comes of scorn 
And loathing of itself. 

Ah, fool, fool, fool, 



Il8 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Who didst mistrust thy love, who was the best, 
And truest, manliest soul with whom the gods 
Have ever blest the earth ; so brave, so strong. 
Fired with such burning hate of powerful ill, 
So loving of the race, so swift to raise 
The fearless arm and mighty club, and sniite 
All monstrous growths with ruin — Zeus himself 
Showed scarce more mighty — and yet was the 

while 
A very man, not cast in mould too fine 
For human love, but ofttimes snared and caught 
By womanish wiles, fast held within the net 
His passions wove. Oh, it was grand to hear 
Of how he went, the champion of his race. 
Mighty in war, mighty in love, now bent 
To more than human tasks, now lapt in ease. 
Now suffering, now enjoying. Strong, vast soul, 
Tuned to heroic deeds, and set on high 
Above the rage of common petty sins — 
Too high to mate with an unequal soul, 
Too full of striving for contented days. 

Ah me, how well I do recall the cause 
Of all our ills ! I was a happy bride 
When that dark At^ which pursues the steps 



DEIANEIRA. II9 

Of heroes — innocent blood-guiltiness — 

Drove us to exile, and I joyed to be 

His own, and share his pain. To a swift stream 

Fleeing we came, where a rough ferryman 

Waited, more brute than man. My hero plunged 

In those fierce depths and battled with their flow, 

And with great labor gained the strand, and bade 

The monster row me to him. But with lust 

And brutal cunning in his eyes, the thing 

Seized me and turned to fly with me, when swift 

An arrow hissed from the unerring bow. 

Pierced him, and loosed his grasp. Then as his eyes 

Grew glazed in death there came in them a gleam 

Of what I know was hate, and he said, ' Take 

This white robe. It is costly. See, my blood 

Has stained it but a little. I did wrong : 

I know it, and repent me. If there come 

A time when he grows cold — for all the race 

Of heroes wander, nor can any love 

Fix theirs for long — take it and wrap him in it, 

And he shall love again.' Then, from the strange 

Deep look within his eyes I shrank in fear, 

And left him half in pity, and I went 

To meet my Lord, who rose from that fierce stream 

Fair as a god. 



I20 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Ah me, the weary days 
We women live, spending our anxious souls. 
Consumed with jealous fancies, hungering still 
For the beloved voice and ear and eye. 
And hungering all in vain ! For life is more 
To youthful manhood than to sit at home 
Before the hearth to watch the children's ways 
And lead the life of petty household care 
Which doth content us women. Day by day 
I pined in Trachis for my love, while he, 
Now in some warlike exploit busied, now 
Fighting some monster, now at some fair court, 
Resting awhile till some new enterprise 
Called him, returned not. News of treacheries 
Punished, friends succored, dreadful monsters slain, 
Came from him : always triumph, always fame. 
And honor, and success, and reverence. 
And sometimes words of love for me who pined 
For more than words, and would have gone to him 
But that the toils of such high errantry 
Asked more than woman's strength. 

So the slow years 
Vexed me alone in Trachis, set forlorn 
In soHtude, nor hearing at the gate 
The frank and cheering voice, nor on the stair 



DEIANEIRA. 1 2 1 

The heavy tread, nor feeling the strong arm 

Around me in the darkling night, when all 

My being ran slow. Last, subtle whispers came 

Of womanish wiles which kept my Lord from me, 

And one who, young and fair, a fresh-blown life 

And virgin, younger, fairer far than I 

When first he loved me, held him in the toils 

Of scarce dissembled love. Not easily 

Might I believe this evil, but at last 

The oft-repeated malice finding me 

Forlorn, and sitting imp-like at my ear, 

Possessed me, and the fire of jealous love 

Raged through my veins, not turned as yet to hate — 

Too well I loved for that — but breeding in me 

Unfaith in him. Love, setting him so high 

And self so low, betrayed me, and I prayed, 

Constrained to hold him false, the immortal gods 

To make him love again. 

But still he came not. 
And still the maddening rumors worked, and still 
' Fair, young, and a king's daughter,' the same words 
Smote me and pierced me. Oh, there is no pain 
In Hades — nay, nor deepest Hell itself. 
Like that of jealous hearts, the torture-pain 
Which racked my life so long. 



122 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Till one fair morn 
There came a joyful message. ' He has come ! 
And at the shrine upon the promontory, 
The fair white shrine upon the purple sea, 
He waits to do his solemn sacrifice 
To the immortal gods ; and with him comes 
A young maid beautiful as Dawn.' 

Then I, 
Mingling despair with love, rapt in deep joy 
That he was come, plunged in the depths of hell 
That she came too, bethought me of the robe 
The Centaur gave me, and the words he spake, 
Forgetting the deep hatred in his eyes, 
And all but love, and sent a messenger 
Bidding hirri wear it for the sacrifice 
To the immortals, knowing not at all 
Whom Fate decreed the victim. 

Shall my soul 
Forget the agonized message which he sent. 
Bidding me come ? For that accursed robe. 
Stained with the poisonous accursed blood, 
Even in the midmost flush of sacrifice 
Clung to him a devouring fire, and ate 
The piteous flesh from his dear limbs, and stung 
His great soft soul to madness. When I came, 



DEIANEIRA. 1 23 

Knowing it was my work, he bent on me, 

Wise as a god through suffering and the near 

Inevitable Death, so that no word 

Of mine was needed, such a tender look 

Of mild reproach as smote me. ' Couldst not thou 

Trust me, who never loved as I love thee ? 

What need was there of magical arts to draw 

The love that never wavered ? I have lived 

As he lives who through perilous paths must pass. 

And lifelong trials, striving to keep down 

The brute within him, born of too much strength 

And sloth and vacuous days ; by difficult toils, 

Labors endured, and hard-fought fights with ill, 

Now vanquished, now triumphant ; and sometimes, 

In intervals of too long labor, finding 

His nature grown too strong for him, falls prone 

Awhile a helpless prey, then once again 

Rises and spurns his chains^ and fares anew 

Along the perilous ways. Dearest, I would 

That thou wert wedded to some knight who stayed 

At home within thy gates, and were content 

To see thee happy. But for me the fierce 

Rude energies of life, the mighty thews. 

The god-sent hate of Wrong, these drove me forth 

To quench the thirst of battle. See, this maid, 



124 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

This is the bride I destined for our son 
Who grows to manhood. Do thou see to her 
When I am dead, for soon I know again 
The frenzy comes, and with it ceasing, death. 
Go, therefore, ere I harm thee when my strength 
Has lost its guidance. Thou wert rich in love, 
Be now as rich in faith. Dear, for thy wrong 
I do forgive thee.' 

When I saw the glare 
Of madness fire his eyes, and my ears heard 
The groans the torture wrung from his great soul, 
I fled with broken heart to the white shrine. 
And knelt in prayer, but still my sad ear took 
The agony of his cries. 

Then I who knew 
There was no hope in god or man for me 
Who had destroyed my Love, and with him slain 
The champion of the suffering race of men. 
And knowing that my soul, though innocent 
Of blood, was guilty of unfaith and vile 
Mistrust, and wrapt in weakness like a cloak, 
And made the innocent tool of hate and wrong 
Against all love and good ; grown sick and filled 
With hatred of myself, rose from my knees. 
And went a little space apart, and found 



DEIANEIRA. 12$ 

A gnarled tree on the cliff, and with my scarf 
Strangling myself, swung lifeless. 

But in death 
I found him not. For, building a vast pile 
Of scented woods on Oeta, as they tell, 
My hero with his own hand lighted it. 
And when the mighty pyre flamed far and wide 
Over all lands and seas, he climbed on it 
And laid him down to die ; but pitying Zeus, 
Before the swift flames reached him, in a cloud 
Descending, snatched the strong brave soul to 

heaven. 
And set him mid the stars. 

Wherefore am I 
Of all the blameless shades within this place 
The most unhappy, if of blame, indeed, 
I bear no load. For what is Sin itself, 
But Error when we miss the road which leads 
Up to the gate of heaven .? Ignorance ! 
What if we be the cause of ignorance ? 
Being blind who might have seen ! Yet do I know 
But self-inflicted pain, nor stain there is 
Upon my soul such as they bear who know 
The dreadful scourge with which the stern judge still 
Lashes their sins. I am forgiven, I know. 



126 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Who loved so much, and one day, if Zeus will, 
I shall go free from hence, and join my Lord, 
And be with him again." 

And straight I seemed, 
Passing, to look upon some scarce-spent life. 
Which knows to-day the irony of Fate 
In self-inflicted pain. 



Together clung 
The ghosts whom next I saw, bound three in one 
By some invisible bond. A sire, of port 
God-like as Zeus, to whom on either hand 
A tender stripling clung. I knew them well. 
As all men know them. One fair youth spake low 
" Father, it does not pain me now, to be 
Drawn close to thee, and by a double bond, 
With this my brother." And the other : " Nay, 
Nor me, O father ; but I bless the chain 
Which binds our souls in union. If some trace 
Of pain still linger, heed it not — 'tis past : 
Still let us cling to thee." 

He with grave eyes 
Full of great tenderness, upon his sons 
Looked with the father's gaze, that is so far 



LAOCOON. 127 

More sweet, and sad, and tender, than the gaze 
Of mothers, — now on this one, now on that, 
Regarding them. " Dear sons, whom on the earth 
I loved and cherished, it was hard to watch 
Your pain ; but now 'tis finished, and w^e stand 
For ever, through all future days of time, 
Symbols of patient suffering undeserved. 
Endured and vanquished. Yet sad memory still 
Brings back our time of trial. 

For the day 
Broke fair when I, the dread Poseidon's priest, 
Joyous because the unholy strife was done. 
And seeing the blue waters now left free 
Of hostile keels — save where upon the verge 
Far off the white sails faded — rose at dawn, 
And white robed, and in garb of sacrifice, 
And with the sacred fillet round my brows. 
Stood at the altar ; and behind, ye twain, 
Decked by your mother's hand with new-cleansed 

robes, 
And with freshflower-wreathedchapletsonyourcurls, 
Attended, and your clear young voices made 
Music that touched your father's eyes with tears. 
If not the careless gods. I seem to hear 
Those high sweet accents mounting in the hymn 



128 THE EPIC OP HADES. 

Which rose to all the blessed gods who dwelt 

Upon the far Olympus — Zeus, the Lord 

And Sovereign Here, and the immortal choir 

Of Deities, but chiefly to the dread 

Poseidon, him who sways the purple sea 

As with a sceptre, shaking the fixed earth 

With stress of thundering surges. By the shrine 

The meek-eyed victim, for the sacrifice, 

Stood with his gilded horns. The hymns were done, 

And I in act to strike, when all the crowd 

Who knelt behind us, with a common fear 

Cried, with a cry that well might freeze the blood. 

And then, with fearful glances towards the sea, 

f^led, leaving us alone — me, the high priest. 

And ye, the acolytes ; forlorn of men. 

Alone, but with our god. 

But we stirred not : 
We could not flee, who in the solemn act 
Of worship, and the ecstasy which comes 
To the believer's soul, saw heaven revealed. 
The mysteries unveiled, the inner sky 
Which meets the enraptured gaze. How should we 

fear 
Who thus were god-encircled ! So wc stood 
While the long ritual spent itself, nor cast 



LAOCOON. 129 

An eye upon the sea. Till as I came 

To that great act which offers up a life 

Before life's Lord, and the full mystery 

Was trembling to completion, quick I heard 

A stifled cry of agony, and knew 

My children's voices. And the father's heart. 

Which is far more than rite or service done 

By man for god, seeing that it is divine 

And comes from God to men — this rising in me, 

Constrained me, and I ceased my prayer, and turned 

To succor you, and lo ! the awful coils 

Which crushed your lives already, bound me round 

And crushed me also, as you clung to me, 

In common death. Some god had heard the prayer, 

And lo ! we were ourselves the sacrifice — . 

The priest, the victim, the accepted life, 

The blood the pain, the salutary loss. 

Was it not better thus to cease and die 
Together in one blest moment, mid the flush 
And ecstasy of worship, and to ki.ow 
Ourselves the victims ? They were wrong who taught 
That 'twas some jealous goddess who destroyed 
Our lives, revengeful for discovered wiles. 
Or hateful of our land. Not readily 



I30 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Should such base passions sway the immortal gods ; 

But rather do I hold it sooth indeed 

That Zeus himself it was, who pitying 

The ruin he foreknew, yet might not stay, 

Since mightier Fate decreed it, sent in haste 

Those dreadful messengers, and bade them take 

The pious lives he loved, before the din 

Of midnight slaughter woke, and the fair town 

Flamed pitifully to the skies, and all 

Was blood and ruin. Surely it was best 

To die as we did, and in death to live, 

A vision for all ages of high pain 

Which passes into beauty, and is merged 

In one accordant whole, as discords merge. 

In that great Harmony which ceaseless rings 

From the tense chords of life, than to have lived 

Our separate lives, and died our separate deaths, 

And left no greater mark than drops which rain 

Upon the unbounded sea. Those hosts which fell 

Before the Scccan gate upon the sand. 

Nor found a bard to sing their fate, but left 

Their bones to dogs and kites — were they more blest 

Than we who, in the people's sight before 

Ilium's unshattered towers, lay down to die 

Our swift miraculous death? Dear sons, and good, 



LAOCOON. 131 

Dear children of my love, now doubly dear 

For this our common sorrow ; suffering weaves 

Not only chains of darkness round, but binds 

A golden glittering link, which though withdrawn 

Or felt no longer, knits us soul to soul. 

In indissoluble bonds, and draws our lives 

So close, that though the individual life 

Be merged, there springs a common life which grows 

To such dread beauty, as has power to take 

The sting from sorrow, and transform the pain 

Into transcendent joy : as from the storm 

The unearthly rainbow draws its myriad hues 

And steeps the world in fairness. All our lives 

Are notes that fade and sink, and so are merged 

In the full harmony of Being. Dear sons, 

Cling closer to me. Life nor Death has torn 

Our lives asunder, as for some, but drawn 

Their separate strands together in a knot 

Closer than Life itself, stronger than Death, 

Insoluble as Fate." 

Then they three clung 
Together — the strong father and young sons. 
And in their loving eyes I saw the Pain 
Fade into Joy, Sufferino- in Beauty lost, 
And Death in Love ! 



n2 THE EPIC OF HADES. 



By a still sullen pool, 
Into its dark depths gazing, lay the ghost 
Whom next I passed. In form, a lovely youth, 
Scarce passed from boyhood. Golden curls were his, 
And wide blue eyes. The semblance of a smile 
Came on his lip — a girl's but for the down 
Which hardly shaded it; but the pale cheek 
Was soft as any maiden's, and his robe 
Was virginal, and at his breast he bore 
The perfumed amber cup which, when March 

comes. 
Gems the dry woods and windy wolds, and speaks 
The resurrection. 

Looking up, he said : 
" Methought I saw her tlien, my love, my fair, 
My beauty, my ideal ; the dim clouds 
Lifted, methought, a little — or was it 
Fond Fancy only ? For I know that here 
No sunbeam cleaves the twilight, but a mist 
Creeps over all the sky and fields and pools, 
And blots them ; and I know I seek in vain 
My earth-sought beauty, nor can Fancy bring 



JVAKCISSUS. 133 

An answer to my thought from these bHnd depths 
And unawakened skies. Yet has use made 
The quest so precious, that I keep it here, 
Well-knowing it is vain. 

On the old earth 
'Twas otherwise, when in fair Thessaly 
I walked regardless of all nymphs who sought 
My love, but sought in vain, whether it were 
Dryad or Naiad from the woods or streams. 
Or white-robed Oread fleeting on the side 
Of fair Olympus, echoing back my sighs. 
In vain, for through the mountains day by day 
I wandered, and along the foaming brooks. 
And by the pine-woods dry, and never took 
A thought for love, nor ever mid the throng 
Of loving nymphs who knew me beautiful 
I dallied, unregarding ; till they said 
Some died for love of me, who loved not one. 
And yet I cared not, wandering still alone 
Amid the mountains by the scented pines. 

Till one fair day, when all the hills were still, 
Nor any breeze made murmur through the woods. 
Nor cloud was on the heavens, I wandered slow, 
Leaving the nymphs who fain with dance and song 



134 ^^^^ EPIC OF HADES. 

Had kept me midst the glades, and strayed away 

Among the pines, enwrapt in fantasy. 

And by the beechen dells which clothe the feet 

Of fair Olympus, wrapt in fantasy. 

Weaving the thin and unembodied shapes 

Which Fancy loves to body forth, and leave 

In marble or in song ; and so strayed down 

To a low sheltered vale above the plains, 

Where the lush grass grew thick, and the stream 

stayed 
Its garrulous tongue ; and last upon the bank 
Of a still pool I came, where was no flow 
Of water, but the depths were clear as air, 
And nothing but the silvery gleaming side 
Of tiny fishes stirred. There lay I down 
Upon the flowery bank, and scanned the deep, 
Half in a waking dream 

Then swift there rose, 
From those enchanted depths, a face more fair 
Than ever I had dreamt of, and I knew 
My sweet long-sought ideal : the thick curls, 
Like these, were golden, and the white robe showed 
Like this ; but for the wondrous eyes and lips, 
The tender loving glance, the sunny smile 
Upon the rosy mouth, these knew I not, 



NAJ^CISSC/S. 135 

Not even in dreams ; and yet I seemed to trace 

Myself within them too, as who should find 

His former self expunged, and him transformed 

To some high thin ideal, separate 

From what he was, by some invisible bar. 

And yet the same in difference. As I moved 

My arms to clasp her to me, lo ! she moved 

Her eager arms to mine, smiled to my smile. 

Looked love to love, and answered longing eyes 

With longing. When my full heart burst in words, 

' Dearest, I love thee,' lo ! the lovely lips, 

' Dearest, I love thee,' sighed, and through the air 

The love-lorn echo rang. But when I longed 

To answer kiss with kiss, and stooped my lips 

To her sweet lips in that long thrill which strains 

Soul unto soul, the cold lymph came between 

And chilled our love, and kept us separate souls 

Which fain would mingle, and the self-same heaven 

Rose, a blue vault above us, and no shade 

Of earthly thing obscured us, as we lay 

Two reflex souls, one and yet different. 

Two sundered souls longing to be at one. 

There, all day long, until the light was gone 
And took my love away, I lay and loved 



136 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The image, and when night was come, ' Farewell,' 

I whispered, and she whispered back, < Farewell,' 

With oh, such yearning ! Many a day we spent 

By that clear pool together all day long. 

And many a clouded day on the wet grass 

I lay beneath the rain, and saw her not. 

And sickened for her ; and sometimes the pool 

Was thick with flood, and hid her ; and sometimes 

Some cold wind ruffled those clear wells, and left 

But glimpses of her, and I rose at eve 

Unsatisfied, a cold chill in my limbs 

And fever at my heart : until, too soon ! 

The summer faded, and the skies were hid, 

And my love came not, but a feverish thirst 

Wasted my life. And all the winter long 

The bright sun shone not, or the thick ribbed ice 

Obscured her, and I pined for her, and knew 

My life ebb from me, till I grew too weak 

To seek her, fearing I should see no more 

My dear. And so the long dead winter waned 

And the slow spring came back. 

And one blithe day, 
When life was in the woods, and the birds sang, 
And soft airs fanned the hills, I knew again 
Some gleam of hope within me, and again 



NARCISSUS. 137 

With feeble limbs crawled forth, and felt the spring 
Blossom within me ; and the flower-starred glades, 
The bursting trees, the building nests, the songs, 
The hurry of life revived me ; and I crept, 
Ghost-like, amid the joy, until I flung 
My panting frame, and weary nerveless limbs, 
Down by the cold still pool. 

And lo ! I saw 
My love once more, not beauteous as of old, 
But oh, how changed ! the fair young cheek grown 

pale, 
The great eyes, larger than of yore, gaze forth 
With a sad yearning look ; and a great pain 
And pity took me which were more than love, 
And with a loud and wailing voice I cried, 
' Dearest, I come again. I pine for thee,' 
And swift she answered back, ' I pine for thee ; ' 
< Come to me, oh, my own,' I cried, and she — 
' Come to me, oh, my own.' Then with a cry 
Of love I joined myself to her, and plunged 
Beneath the icy surface with a kiss. 
And fainted, and' am here. 

And now, indeed, 
I know not if it was myself I sought. 
As some tell, or another. For I hold 



138 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

That what we seek is but our other self, 
Other and higher, neither wholly like 
Nor wholly different, the half-life the gods 
Retained when half was given — one the man 
And one the woman ; and I longed to round 
The imperfect essence by its complement, 
For only thus the perfect life stands forth 
Whole, self-sufficing. Worse it is to live 
Ill-mated than imperfect, and to move 
From a false centre, not a perfect sphere, 
But with a crooked bias sent oblique 
Athwart life's furrows. 'Twas myself, indeed. 
Thus only that I sought, that lovers use 
To see in that they love, not that which is. 
But that their fancy feigns, and view themselves 
Reflected in their love, yet glorified, 
And finer and more pure. 

Wherefore it is : 
All love which finds its own ideal mate 
Is happy — happy that which gives itself 
Unto itself, and keeps, through long calm years, 
The tranquil image in its eyes, and knows 
Fulfilment and is blest, and day by day 
Wears love like a white flower, nor holds it less 
Though sharp winds bite, or hot suns fade, or age 



NARCISSUS. 139 

Sully its perfect whiteness, but inhales 

Its fragrance, and is glad. But happier still 

He who long seeks a high goal unattained, 

And wearies for it all his days, nor knows 

Possession sate his thirst, but still pursues 

The fleeting loveliness — now seen, now lost, 

But evermore grown fairer, till at last 

He stretches forth his arms and takes the fair 

In one long rapture, and its name is Death." 

Thus he ; and seeing me stand grave : " Farewell. 
If ever thou shouldst happen on a wood 
In Thessaly, upon the plain-ward spurs 
Of fair Olympus, take the path which winds 
Through the close vale, and thou shalt see the pool 
Where once I found my life. And if in Spring 
Thou go there, round the margin thou shalt know 
These amber blooms bend meekly, smiling down 
Upon the crystal surface. Pluck them not. 
But kneel a little while, and breathe a prayer 
To the fair god of Love, and let them be. 
For in those tender flowers is hid the life 
That once was mine. All things are bound in one 
In earth and heaven, nor is there any gulf 
'Twixt things that live, — the flower that was a life. 



I40 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The life that is a flower, — but one sure chain 
Binds all, as now I know. 

If there are still- 
Fair Oreads on the hills, say to them, sir, 
They must no longer pine for me, but find 
Some worthier lover, who can love again ; 
For I have found my love." 

And to the pool 
He turned, and gazed with lovely eyes, and showed 
Fair as an angel. 



Leaving him enwrapt 
In musings, to a gloomy pass I came 
Between dark rocks, where scarce a gleam of light, 
Not even the niggard light of that dim land. 
Might enter ; and the soil was black and bare. 
Nor even the thin growths which scarcely clothed 
The higher fields might live. Hard by a cave 
Which sloped down steeply to the lowest depths, 
Whence dreadful sounds ascended, seated still, 
Her head upon her hands, I saw a maid 
With eyes fixed on the ground — not Tartarus 
It was, but Hades; and she knew no pain. 
Except her painful thought. Yet there it seemed, 



MEDUSA. 141 

As here, the unequal measure which awaits 
The adjustment, and meanwhile, inspires the strife 
Which rears life's palace walls ; and fills the sail 
Which bears our bark, across unfathomed seas, 
To its last harbor ; this bore sway there too, 
And 'twas a luckless shade which sat and wept 
Amid the gloom, though blameless. Suddenly, 
She raised her head, and lo ! the long curls, writhed, 
Tangled, and snake-like — ^like the dripping hair 
Of some young life which, ending sin with life. 
From out the cruel wintry flow, is laid 
Stark on the snow with dreadful staring eyes 
Like hers. For when she raised her eyes to mine, 
They chilled my blood, so great a woe they bore ; 
And as she gazed, wide-eyed, I knew my pulse 
Beat slow, and my limbs stiffen. Then they wore. 
At length, a softer look, and life revived 
Within my breast as thus she softly spoke : 

" Nay, friend, I would not harm thee. I have 
known 
Great sorrow, and sometimes it racks me still, 
And turns me into stone, and makes my eyes 
As dreadful as of yore ; and yet it comes 
But seldom, as thou sawest, now, for Time 



142 THE EPIC OE HADES. 

And Death have heahng hands. Only I love 
To sit within the darkness here, nor face 
The throng of happier ghosts ; if any ghost 
Of happiness come here. For on the earth 
They wronged me bitterly, and turned to stone 
My heart, till scarce I knew if e'er I was 
The happy girl of yore. 

That youth who dreams 
Up yonder by the margin of the lake, 
Knew but a cold ideal love, but me 
Love in unearthly guise, but bodily form, 
Seized and betrayed. 

I was a priestess once. 
Of stern Athend, doing day by day 
Due worship ; raising, every dawn that came, 
My cold pure hymns to take her virgin ear ; 
Nor sporting with the joyous company 
Of youths and maids, who at the neighboring shrine 
Of Aphroditd served. Nor dance nor song 
Allured me, nor the pleasant days of youth 
And twilights mid the vines. They held me cold 
Who were my friends in childhood. For my soul 
Was virginal, and at the virgin shrine 
I knelt, athirst for knowledge. Day by day 
The long cold ritual sped, the liturgies 



MEDUSA. 143 

Were done, the barren hymns of praise went up 
Before the goddess, and the ecstasy 
Of faith possessed me wholly, till almost 
I knew not I was woman. Yet I knew 
That I was fair to see, and fit to share 
Some natural honest love, and bear the load 
Of children like the rest ; only my soul 
Was lost in higher yearnings. 

Like a god, 
He burst upon those pallid lifeless days. 
Bringing fresh airs and salt, as from the sea. 
And wrecked my life. How should a virgin know 
Deceit, who never at the joyous shrine 
Of Cypris knelt, but ever lived apart. 
And so grew guilty ? For if I had spent 
My days among the throng, either my fault 
Were blameless or undone. For innocence 
The tempter spreads his net. For innocence 
The gods keep all their terrors. Innocence 
It is that bears the burden, which for guilt 
Is lightened, and the spoiler goes his way, 
Uncaring, joyous, leaving her alone, 
The victim and unfriended. 

Was it just 
In her, my mistress, who had had my youth. 



144 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

To wreak such vengeance on me ? I had erred, 
It may be: but on him. whose was the guilt, 
No heaven-sent vengeance Hghted, but he sped 
Away to other hearts across the deep. 
Careless and free ; but me, the cold stern eyes 
Of the pure goddess withered ; and the scorn 
Of maids, despised before, and the great blank 
Of love, whose love was gone — this 



wrung mv 



heart 
And froze my blood ; set on my brow despair. 
And turned my gaze to stone, and filled my eyes 
With horror, and stiffened the soft curls which once 
Lay smooth and fair into such snake-like rings 
As made my aspect fearful. All who saw. 
Shrank from me and grew cold, and felt the warm. 
Full tide of life freeze in them, seeing in me 
Love's work, who sat wrapt up and lost in shame, 
As in a cloak, consuming my own heart, 
And was in hell alreadv. As thev gazed 
Upon me, my despair looked forth so cold 
From out my eyes, that if some spoiler came 
Fresh from his wickedness, and looked on them, 
Their glare would strike him dead ; and those fair 

curls. 
Which once the accursed toyed with, grew to be 



MEDUSA. 145 

The poisonouf^ things thou seest ; and so, with hate 
Of man's injustice and the gods', who knew 
Me blameless, and yet punished me ; and sick 
Of life and love, and loathing earth and sky, 
And feeding on my sorrow. Hate at last 
Left me a Fury, 

Ah, the load of life 
Which lives for hatred ! We are made to love — 
We women, and the injury which turns 
The honey of our lives to gall, transforms 
The angel to the fiend. For it is sweet 
To know the dreadful sense of strength, and smite 
And leave the tyrant dead with a glance ; ay ! sweet, 
In that fierce lust of power, to slay the life 
Which harmed not, when the suppliants' cry ascends 
To ears which hate has deafened. So I lived 
Long time in misery ; to my sleepless eyes 
No heahng slumbers coming ; but at length, 
Zeus and the goddess pitying, I knew 
Soft rest once more veiling my dreadful gaze 
In peaceful slumbers. Then a blessed dream 
I dreamt. For, lo ! a god-like knight in mail 
Of gold, who sheared with his keen flashing blade ; 
With scarce a pang of pain, the visage cold 
Which too great sorrow left me ; at one stroke, 



146 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Clean from the trunk, and then o'er land and sea, 

Invisible, sped with winged heels, to where. 

Upon a sea-worn cape, a fair young maid. 

More blameless even than I was, chained and bound. 

Waited a monster from the deep and stood 

In innocent nakedness. Then, as he rose, 

Loathsome, from out the depths, a monstrous growth, 

A creature wholly serpent, partly man. 

The wrongs that I had known, stronger than death. 

Rose up with such black hate in me again. 

And wreathed such hissing poison through my hair, 

And shot such deadly glances from my eyes. 

That naught that saw might live. And the vile 

worm 
Was slain, and she delivered. Then I dreamt 
My mistress, whom I thought so stern to me, 
Athene, set those dreadful staring eyes. 
And that despairing visage, on her shield 
Of chastity, and bears it evermore 
To fright the waverer from the wrong he would, 
And strike the unrepenting spoiler, dead." 

Then for a little paused she, while I saw 
Again her eyes grown di;eadful, till once more, 
And with a softer glance : 



MEDUSA. 147 

" From that blest dream 
I woke not on the earth, but only here. 
And now my pain is lightened since I know 
My dream, which was a dream within the dream 
Which is our life, fulfilled. And I have saved 
Another through my suffering, and through her 
A people. Oh, strange chain of sacrifice, 
That binds an innocent life, and from its blood 
And sorrow works out joy ! Oh, mystery 
Of pain and evil ! wrong grown salutary. 
And mighty to redeem ! If thou shouldst see 
A woman on the earth, who pays to-day 
Like penalty of sin, and the new gods 
(For after Saturn, Zeus ruled ; after him 
It may be there are others) love to take 
The tender heart of girlhood, and to immure 
Within a cold and cloistered cell the life 
Which nature meant to bless, and if Love come 
Hold her accursed ; or to some poor maid, 
Forlorn and trusting, still the tempter comes 
And works his wrong, and leaves her in despair 
And shame and all abhorrence, while he goes 
His way unpunished, — if thou know her eyes 
Freeze thee like mine — oh ! bid her lose her pain 
In succoring others — say to her that Time 



148 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And Death have healing hands, and here there 

comes 
To the forgiven transgressor only pain 
Enough to chasten joy ! " 

And a soft tear 
Trembled within her eyes, and her sweet gaze 
Was as the Magdalen's, the horror gone 
And a great radiance come. 



ADONIS. 149 



Then as I passed 
To upper air, I saw two figures rise 
Together, one a woman with a grave 
Fair face not all unhappy, and the robes 
And presence of a queen ; and with her walked 
The fairest youth that ever maiden's dream 
Conceived. And as they came, the throng of ghosts, 
For these who were not wholly ghosts, arose. 
And did them homage. Not the chain of love 
Bound them, but such calm kinship as is bred 
Of long and difficult pilgrimages borne 
Though common perils by two souls which share 
A common weary exile. Nor as ghosts 
These showed, but rather like two lives which hung 
Suspended in a trance. A halo of life 
Played round them, and they brought a sweet brisk 

air 
Tasting of earth and heaven, like sojourners 
Who stayed but for awhile, and knew a swift 
Release await them. First the youth it was 
Who spake thus as they passed : 

'' Dread Queen, once more 



I50 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

I feel life stir within me, and my blood 
Runs faster, while a new strange cycle turns 
And grows completed. Soon on the dear earth. 
Under the lively light of fuller day, 
I shall revive me of my wound ; and thou, 
Passing with me yon cold and lifeless stream, 
And the grim monster who will fawn on thee, 
Shalt issue in royal pomp, and wreathed with flowers, 
Upon the cheerful earth, leaving behind 
A deeper winter for the ghosts who dwell 
Within these sunless haunts ; and I shall lie 
Once more within loved arms, and thou shalt see 
Thy early home, and kiss thy mother's cheek, 
And be a girl again. But not for long ; 
For ere the bounteous Autumn spreads her hues 
Of gold and purple, a cold voice will call 
And bring us to these wintry lands once more, 
As erst so often. Blest are we, indeed. 
Above the rest, and yet I would I knew 
The careless joys of old. 

For in hot youth, 
Oh, it was sweet to greet the balmy night 
That was love's nurse, and feel the weary eyes 
Closed by soft kisses, — sweet at early dawn 
To wake refreshed and, scarce from loving arms 



ADONIS. 1 5 

Leaping, to issue forth, with winding horn, 
By dewy heath and brake, and taste the fair 
Young breath of early morning ; and 'twas sweet 
To chase the bounding quarry all day long 
With my true hounds and rapid steed, and gay 
Companions of my youth, and with the eve 
To turn home laden with the spoil, and take 
The banquet which awaited, and sweet wine 
Poured out, and kisses pressed on loving lips ; 
Circled by snowy arms. Oh, it was sweet 
To be alive and young ! 

For sure it is 
The gods gave not quick pulses and hot blood 
And strength and beauty for no end, but would 
That we should use them wisely ; and the fair, 
Sweet mistress of my service was, indeed, 
Worthy of all observance. Oh, her eyes 
When I lay bleeding ! All day long we rode, 
I and my youthful peers, with horse and hound, 
And knew the joy of swift pursuit and toil 
And peril. At the last, a fierce boar turned 
At bay, and with his gleaming tusks o'erthrew 
My steed, and as I fell upon the flowers. 
Pierced me as with a sword. Then, as I lay, 
I knew the strange slow chill which, stealing, tells 



152 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The young that it is death. Yet knew I not 
Or pain or fear, only great pity, indeed, 
That she should lose her love, who was so fond 
And gracious. But when, lifting my dim gaze, 
I saw her bend o'er me, — the lovely eyes 
Suffused with tears, and her sweet smile replaced 
By agonized sorrow, — for a while I stayed 
Life's ebbing tide, and raised my cold, white lips. 
With a faint smile, to hers. Then, with a kiss — 
One long last kiss, we mingled, and I knew 
No more. 

But even in death, so strong is Love, 
I could not wholly die ; and year by year. 
When the bright springtime comes, and the earth lives. 
Love opens these dread gates, and calls me forth 
Across the gulf. Not here, indeed, she comes, 
Being a goddess and in heaven, but smooths 
My path to the old earth, where still I know 
Once more the sweet lost days, and once again 
Blossom on that soft breast, and am again 
A youth, and rapt in love ; and yet not all 
As careless as of yore ; but seem to know 
The early spring of passion, tamed, by time 
And suffering, to a calmer, fuller flow, 
Less fitful, but more strong." 



PERSEPHONE. 1 53 

Then the sad Queen : 
" Fair youth, thy lot I know, for I am old 
As the old earth and yet as young as is 
The budding spring, and I was here a Queen, 
When Love was not or Time, and to my arms 
Thou camest as a little child, to dwell 
Within the halls of Death, for without Death 
There were nor Birth nor Love, nor would Life yearn 
To lose itself within another life. 
And dying, to be born. I, too, have died 
For love in part, and live again through love ; 
For in the far-off years, when Time was young. 
And Love unborn on earth, and Zeus in heaven 
Ruled, a young sovereign ; I, a maiden, dwelt 
With dread Demeter on the lovely plains 
Of sunny Sicily. There, day by day, 
I sported with the maiden goddesses, 
In virgin freedom. Budding age made gay 
Our lightsome feet, and on the flowery slopes 
We wandered daily, gathering flowers to weave 
In careless garlands for our locks, and passed 
The days in innocent gladness. Thought of Love 
There came not to us, for as yet the earth 
Was virginal, nor yet had Eros come 
With his delicious pain. 



I 54 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And one fair morn — 
Not all the ages blot it — on the side 
Of yEtna we were straying. There was then 
Summer nor winter, springtide nor the time 
Of harvest, but the soft unfailing sun 
Shone always, and the sowing time was one 
With reaping ; fruit and flowers together sprung 
Upon the trees ; and blade and ripened ear 
Together clothed the plains. There, as I strayed, 
Sudden a black cloud down the rugged side 
Of ^tna, mixed with fire and dreadful sound 
Of thunder, rolled around me, and I heard 
The maids who were my fellows turn and flee. 
With shrieks and cries for me. 

But I, I knew 
No terror while the god o'ershadowed me. 
Hiding my life in his, nor when I wept 
My flowers all withered, and my blood ran slow 
Within a wintry land. Some voice there was 
Which said, ' Fear not. Thou shalt return and see 
Thy mother again, only a little while 
Fate wills that thou shouldst tarry, and become 
Queen of another world. Thou seest that all 
Thy flowers are faded. They shall hve again 
On earth, as thou shalt, as thou livest now 



PERSEPHONE. I 5 5 

The Life of Death — for what is Death but Life 
Suspended as in sleep ? The changeless rule 
Where life was constant, and the sun o'erhead, 
Blazed forth for ever, changes and is hidden 
Awhile. This region which thou seest, where all 
The trees are lifeless, and the flowers are dead. 
Is but the self-same earth on which erewhile 
Thou sportedst fancy free.' 

So, without fear 
I wandered on this bare land, seeing far 
Upon the sky the peaks of my own hills 
And crests of my own woods. Till, when I grew 
Hungered, ere yet another form I saw ; 
Along the silent alleys journeying. 
And leafless groves ; a fair and mystic tree 
Rose like a heart in shape, and mid its leaves 
One golden mystic fruit with a fair seed 
Hid in it. This, with childish hand, I took 
And ate, and straight I knew the tree was Life, 
And the fruit Death, and the hid seed was Love. 

Ah, sweet strange fruit! the which if any taste 
They may no longer keep their lives of old 
Or their own selves unchanged, but some weird 
change 



156 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And subtle alchemy comes which can transmute 
The blood, and mould the spirits of gods and men 
In some new magical form. Not as before, 
Our life comes to us, though the passion cools, 
No, never as before. My mother came 
Too late to seek me. She had power to raise 
A life from out Death's grasp, but from the arms 
Of Love she might not take me, nor undo 
Love's past for all her strength. She came and 

sought 
With fires her daughter over land and sea, 
Beyond the paths of all the setting stars, 
In vain, and over all the earth in vain. 
Seeking whom love disguised. Then on all lands 
She cast the spell of barrenness ; the wheat 
Was blighted in the ear, the purple grapes 
Blushed no more on the vines, and all the gods 
Were sorrowful, seeing the load of ill 
My rape had laid on men. Last, Zeus himself, 
Pitying the evil that was done, sent forth 
His messenger beyond the western rim 
To fetch me back to earth. 

But not the same 
He found me who had eaten of Love's seed, 
But changed into another ; nor could his power 



PERSEPHONE. 1 5 7 

Prevail to keep me wholly on the earth, 

Or make me maid again. The wintry life 

Is homelier often than the summer blaze 

Of happiness unclouded ; so, when Spring 

Comes on the world, I, coming, cross with thee, 

Year after year, the cruel icy stream ; 

And leave this anxious sceptre and the shades 

Of those in hell, or those for whom, though blest, 

No Spring comes, till the last great Spring which 

brings 
New heavens and new earth ; and lay my head 
Upon my mother's bosom, and grow young. 
And am a girl again. 

A soft air breathes 
Across the stream, and fills these barren fields 
With the sweet odors of the earth. I know 
Again the perfume of the violets 
Which bloom on Etna's side. Soon we shall pass 
Together to our home, while round our feet 
The crocus flames like gold, the wind-flowers white 
Wave their soft petals on the breeze, and all 
The choir of flowers lift up their silent song 
To the unclouded heavens. Thou, fair boy, 
Shalt lie within thy love's white arms again, 
And I within my mother's. Sweet is Love 



158 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

In ceasing and renewal ; nay, in these 

It lives and has its being. Thou couldst not keep 

Thy youth as now, if always on the breast 

Of love too late a lingerer thou hadst known 

Possession sate thee. Nor might I have kept 

My mother's heart, if I had lived to ripe 

And wither on the stalk. Time calls and Change 

Commands both men and gods, and speeds us on 

We know not whither ; but the old earth smiles 

Spring after Spring, and the seed bursts again 

Out of its prison mould, and the dead lives 

Renew themselves, and rise aloft and soar 

And are transformed, clothing themselves with 

change 
Till the last change be done." 

As thus she spake, 
I saw a gleam of light flash from the eyes 
Of all the listening shades, and a great joy 
Thrill through the realms of Death. 



endymion: 159 



And then again 
A youthful shade I saw, a comely boy, 
With lip and cheek just touched with manly down, 
And strong limbs wearing Spring; in mien and garb 
A youthful chieftain, with a perfect face 
Of fresh young beauty, clustered curls divine, 
And chiselled features like a sculptured god. 
But warm and breathing life ; only the eyes, 
The fair large eyes, were full of dreaming thought, 
And seemed to gaze beyond the world of sight. 
On a hid world of beauty. Him I stayed. 
Accosting with soft words of courtesy ; 
And, on a bank of scentless flowers reclined. 
He answered thus : 

" Not for the garish sun 
I long, nor for the splendors of high noon 
In this dim land I languish ; for of yore 
Full often, when the swift chase swept along 
Through the brisk morn, or when my comrades 

called 
To wrestling, or the foot-race, or to cleave 
The sunny stream, I loved to walk apart, 



l6o THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Self-centred, sole; and when the laughing girls 

To some fair stripling's oaten melody 

Made ready for the dance, I heeded not ; 

Nor when to the loud trumpet's blast and blare 

My peers rode forth to battle. For, one eve, 

In Latmos, after a long day in June, 

I stayed to rest me on a sylvan hill, 

Where often youth and maid were wont to meet 

Towards moonrise; and deep slumber fell on me 

Musing on Love, just as the ruddy orb 

Rose on the lucid night, set in a frame 

Of blooming myrtle and sharp tremulous plane ; 

Deep slumber fell, and loosed my limbs in rest. 

Then, as the full orb poised upon the peak. 
There came a lovely vision of a maid. 
Who seemed to step as from a golden car 
Out of the low-hung moon. No mortal form. 
Such as ofttimes of yore I knew and clasped 
At twilight mid the vines at the mad feast 
Of Dionysus, or the fair maids cold 
Who streamed in white processions to the shrine 
Of the chaste Virgin Goddess ; but a shape 
Richer and yet more pure. No thinnest veil 
Obscured her ; but each exquisite limb revealed, 



ENDYMION. l6l 

Gleamed like a golden statue subtly wrought 

By a great sculptor on the architrave 

Of some high temple-front — only in her 

The form was soft and warm, and charged with 

life, 
And breathing. As I seemed to gaze on her, 
Nearer she drew and gazed ; and as I lay 
Supine, as in a spell, the radiance stooped 
And kissed me on the lips, a chaste, sweet kiss, 
Which drew my spirit with it. So I slept 
Each night upon the hill, until the dawn 
Came in her silver chariot from the East, 
And chased my Love away. But ever thus 
Dissolved in love as in a heaven-sent dream, 
Whenever the bright circle of the moon 
Climbed from the hills, whether in leafy June 
Or harvest-tide, or when they leapt and pressed 
Red-thighed the spouting must, I walked apart 
From all, and took no thought for mortal maid. 
Nor nimble joys of youth ; but night by night 
I stole, when all were sleeping, to the hill. 
And slumbered and was blest ; until I grew 
Possest by love so deep, I seemed to live 
In slumber only, while the waking day 
Showed faint as any vision. 



1 62 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

So I turned 
Paler and paler with the months, and climbed 
The steep with labored steps and difficult breath, 
But still I climbed. Ay, though the wintry frost 
Chained fast the streams and whitened all the fields, 
I sought my mistress through the leafless groves, 
And slumbered and was happy, till the dawn 
Returning found me stretched out, cold and stark, 
With life's fire nigh burnt out. Till one clear night, 
When the birds shivered in the pines, and all 
The inner heavens stood open, lo ! she came. 
Brighter and kinder still, and kissed my eyes 
And half-closed lips, and drew my soul through them, 
And in one precious ecstasy dissolved 
My life. And thenceforth, ever on the hill 
I lie unseen of man ; a cold, white form. 
Still young, through all the ages ; but my soul, 
Clothed in this thin presentment of old days. 
Walks this dim land, where never moonrise comes, 
Nor day-break, but a twilight waiting-time. 
No more ; and, ah ! how weary ! Yet I judge 
My lot a higher far than his who spends 
His youth on swift hot pleasure, quickly past; 
Or theirs, my equals', who through long calm years 
Grew sleek in dull content of wedded lives 



ENDYMION. 163 

And fair-grown offspring. Many a day for them, 
While I was wandering here, and my bones bleached 
Upon the rocks, the sweet autumnal sun 
Beamed, and the grapes grew purple. Many a day 
They heaped up gold, they knelt at festivals, 
They waxed in high report and fame of men, 
They gave their girls in marriage ; while for me 
Upon the untrodden peaks, the cold, grey morn. 
The snows, the rains, the winds, the untempered 

blaze, 
Beat year by year, until 1 turned to stone. 
And the great eagles shrieked at me, and wheeled 
Affrighted. Yet 1 judge it best indeed 
To seek in life, as now I know I sought. 
Some fair impossible Love, which slays our life. 
Some high ideal raised too high for man ; 
And failing to grow mad, and cease to be. 
Than to decline, as they do who have found 
Broad-paunched content and weal and happiness : 
And so an end. For one day, as I know. 
The high aim unfulfilled fulfils itself ; 
The deep, unsatisfied thirst is satisfied ; 
And through this twilight, broken suddenly, 
The inmost heaven, the lucent stars of God, 
The Moon of Love, the Sun of Life; and I, 



164 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

I who pine here — I on the Latmian hill 
Shall soar aloft and find them." 

With the word, 
There beamed a shaft of dawn athwart the skies, 
And straight the sentinel thrush within the yew 
Sang out reveille to the hosts of day, 
Soldierly ; and the pomp and rush of life 
Began once more, and left me there alone 
Amid the awaking world. 



PSYCHE. 165 



Nay, not alone. 
One fair shade lingered in the fuller day, 
The last to come, when now my dream had grown 
Half mixed with waking thoughts, as grows a 

dream 
In summer mornings when the broader light 
Dazzles the sleeper's eyes ; and is most fair 
Of all and best remembered, and becomes 
Part of our waking life, when older dreams 
Grow fainter, and are fled. So this remained 
The fairest of the visions that I knew. 
Most precious and most dear. 

The increasing light 
Shone through her, finer than the thinnest shade, 
And yet most full of beauty ; golden wings. 
From her fair shoulders springing, seemed to lift 
Her stainless feet from the cold ground and snatch 
Their wearer into air ; and in her eyes 
Was such fair glance as comes from virgin love, 
Long chastened and triumphant. Every trace 
Of earth had vanished from her, and she showed 
As one who walks a saint already in life, 



1 66 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Virgin or mother. Immortality 

Breathed from those radiant eyes which yet had 

passed 
Between the gates of death. I seemed to hear 
The ipul of mortals speaking : 

" I was born 
Of a great race and mighty, and was grown 
Fair, as they said, and good, and kept a life 
Pure from all stain of passion. Love I knew not. 
Who was absorbed in duty ; and the Mother 
Of gods and men, seeing my life more calm 
Than human, hating my impassive heart, 
Sent down her perfect son in wrath to earth. 
And bade him break me. 

But when Eros came, 
It did repent him of the task, for Love 
Is kin to Duty. 

And within my life 
I knew miraculous change, and a soft flame 
Wherefrom tlie snows of Duty flushed to rose. 
And the chill icy flow of mind was turned 
To a warm stream of passion. Long I lived 
Not knowing what had been, nor recognized 
A Presence walking with me through my life, 
As if by night, his face and form concealed ; 



PSYCHE. 167 



A gracious voice alone, which none but I 

Might hear, sustained me, and its name was Love. 



Not as the earthly loves which throb and flush 
Round earthly shrines was mine, but a pure spirit, 
Lovelier than all embodied love, more pure 
And wonderful ; but never on his eyes 
I looked, which still were hidden, and I knew not 
The fashion of his nature ; for by night. 
When visual eyes are blind, but the soul sees, 
Came he, and bade me seek not to enquire 
Or whence he came or wherefore. Nor knew I 
His name. And always ere the coming day. 
As if he were the Sun-god, lingering 
With some too well-loved maiden, he would rise 
And vanish until eve. But all my being 
Thrilled with my fair unearthly visitant 
To higher duty and more glorious meed 
Of action than of old, for it was Love 
Who came to me, who might not know his name. 

Thus, ever rapt by dreams divine, I knew 
The scorn that comes from weaker souls, w^hich miss, 
Being too low of nature, the great joy 
Revealed to others higher ; nay, my sisters, 



1 68 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Who being of one blood with me, made choice 

To tread the lower ways of daily life, 

Grew jealous of me, bidding me take heed 

Lest haply 'twas some monstrous fiend I loved, 

Such as in fable ofttimes sought and won 

The innocent hearts of maids. Long time I held 

My love too dear for doubt, who was so sweet 

And lovable. But at the last the sneers, 

The mystery which hid him, the swift flight 

Before the coming dawn, the shape concealed, 

The curious girlish heart, these worked on me 

With an unsatisfied thirst. Not his own words : 

' Dear, I am with thee only while I keep 

My visage hidden ; and if thou once shouldst see 

My face, I must forsake thee : the high gods 

Link Love with Faith, and he withdraws himself 

From the full gaze of Knowledge ' — not even these 

Could cure me of my longing, or the fear 

Those mocking voices worked ; who fain would 

learn 
The worst that might befall. 

And one sad night. 
Just as the day leapt from the hills and brought 
The hour when he should go : with tremulous hands, 
Lighting my midnight lamp in fear, I stood 



PSYCHE. 169 

Long time uncertain, and at length turned round 

And gazed upon my love. He lay asleep, 

And oh, how fair he was ! The flickering light 

Fell on the fairest of the gods, stretched out 

In happy slumber. Looking on his locks 

Of gold, and faultless face and smile, and limbs 

Made perfect, a great joy and trembling took me 

Who was most blest of women, and in awe 

And fear I stooped to kiss him. One warm drop — 

From the full lamp within my trembling hand, 

Or a glad tear from my too happy eyes, 

Fell on his shoulder. 

Then the god unclosed 
His lovely eyes, and with great pity spake : 
' Farewell ! There is no Love except with Faith, 
And thine is dead ! Farewell ! I come no more.' 
And straightway from the hills the full red sun 
Leapt up, and as I clasped my love again, 
The lovely vision faded from his place. 
And came no more. 

Then I, with breaking heart. 
Knowing my life laid waste by my own hand. 
Went forth and would have sought to hide my life 
Within the stream of Death ; but Death came not 
To aid me who not yet was meet for Death. 



170 THE EPIC Oi^" HADES. 

Then finding that Love came not back to me, 
I thought that in the temples of the gods 
Haply he dwelt, and so from fane to fane 
I wandered over earth, and knelt in each, 
Enquiring for my Love ; and I would ask 
The priests and worshippers, ' Is this Love's shrine? 
Sirs, have you seen the god ? ' But never at all 
I found him. For some answered, ' This is called 
The Shrine of Knowledge ; ' and another, < This, 
The Shrine of Beauty ; ' and another, ' Strength ; ' 
And yet another, ' Youth.' And I would kneel 
And say a prayer to my Love, and rise 
And seek another. Long, o'er land and sea, 
I wandered, till I was not young or fair. 
Grown wretched, seeking my lost Love ; and last. 
Came to the smiling, hateful shrine where ruled 
The queen of earthly love and all delight, 
Cypris, but knelt not there, but asked of one 
Who seemed her priest, if Eros dwelt with her. 

Then to the subtle-smiUng goddess' self 
They led me. She with hatred in her eyes: 
' What ! thou to seek for Love, who art grown thin 
And pale with watching ! He is not for thee. 
What Love is left for such 1 Thou didst despise 



PSYCHE. 171 

Love, and didst dwell apart. Love sits within 
The young maid's eyes, making them beautiful. 
Love is for youth, and joy, and happiness ; 
And not for withered lives. Ho ! bind her fast. 
Take her and set her to the vilest tasks, 
And bend her pride by solitude and tears 
Who will not kneel to me, but dares to seek 
A disembodied love. My son has gone 
And left thee for thy fault, and thou shalt know 
The misery of my thralls.' 

Then in her house 
They bound me to hard tasks and vile, and kept 
My life from honor, chained among her slaves 
And lowest ministers, taking despite 
And injury for food, and set to bind 
Their wounds whom she had tortured, and to feed 
The pitiful lives which in her prisons pent 
Languished in hopeless pain. There is no sight 
Of suffering but I saw it, and was set 
To succqr it ; and all my woman's heart 
Was torn with the ineffable miseries 
Which love and life have worked ; and dwelt long 

time 
In groanings and in tears. 

And then, oh joy ! 



1/2 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Oh miracle ! once more at length again 

I felt Love's arms around me, and the kiss 

Of Love upon my lips, and in the chill 

Of deepest prison cells, mid vilest tasks, 

The glow of his sweet breath, and the warm touch 

Of his invisible hand, and his sweet voice. 

Ay, sweeter than of old, and tenderer, 

Speak to me, pierce me, hold me, fold me round 

With arms Divine, till all the sordid earth 

Was hued like heaven, and Life's dull prison-house 

Turned to a golden palace, and those low tasks 

Grew to be higher works and nobler gains 

Than any gains of knowledge, and at last 

He whispered softly, ' Dear, unclose thine eyes. 

Thou mayst look on me now. I go no more, 

But am thine own for ever.' 

Then with wings 
Of gold we soared, I looking in his eyes, 
Over yon dark broad river, and this dim land. 
Scarce for an instant staying till we reached 
The inmost courts of heaven. 

But sometimes still 
I come here for a little, and speak a word 
Of peace to those who wait. The slow wheel turns. 
The cycles round themselves and grow complete, 



PSYCHE. 173 

The world's year whitens to the harvest-tide, 

And one word only am I sent to say 

To those dear souls, who wait here, or who now 

Breathe earthly air — one universal word 

To all things living, and the word is ' Love.' " 

Then soared she visibly before my gaze, 
And the heavens took her, and I knew my eyes 
Had seen the soul of man, the deathless soul, 
Defeated, struggling, purified, and blest. 



Then all the choir of happy waiting shades. 
Heroes and queens, fair maidens and brave youths, 
Swept by me, rhythmic, slow, as if they trod 
Some unheard measure, passing where I stood 
In fair procession, each with a faint smile 
Upon the lip, signing " Farewell, oh shade ! 
It shall be well with thee, as 'tis with us. 
If only thou art true. The world of Life, 
The world of Death, are but opposing sides 
Of one great orb, and the Light shines on both. 
Oh, happy happy shade ! Farewell ! Farewell ! " 
And so they passed away. 

END OF BOOK II. 



BOOK III. 

OLYMPUS. 



But I, my gaze 
Following the soaring soul which now was lost 
In the awakening skies, floated with her, 
As in a trance, beyond the golden gates 
Which separate Earth from Heaven ; and to my 

thought 
Gladdened by that broad effluence of light, 
This old earth seemed transfigured, and the fields, 
So dim and bare, grew green and clothed themselves 
With lustrous hues. A fine ethereal air 
Played round me as I mused, and filled the soul 
With an ineffable content. What need 
Of words to tell of things unreached by words ? 
Or seek to engrave upon the treacherous thought 
The fair and fugitive fancies of a dream, 
Which vanish ere we fix them ? 

But methinks 
He knows the scene, who knows the one fair day. 
One only and no more, which year by year 
In springtime comes, when lingering winter flies, 
177 



1/8 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And lo ! the trees blossom in white and pink, 
And golden clusters, and the glades are filled 
With delicate primrose and deep odorous beds 
Of violets, and on the tufted meads 
With kingcups starred, and cowslip bells, and 

blue 
Sweet hyacinths, and frail anemones, 
The broad West wind breathes sofdy, and the air 
Is tremulous with the lark, and thro' the woods 
The soft full-throated thrushes all day long 
Flood the green dells with joy, and thro' the dry 
Brown fields the sower strides, sowing his seed. 
And all is life and song. Or he who first. 
Whether in fair free boyhood, when the world 
Is his to choose, or when his fuller life 
Beats to another life, or afterwards, 
Keeping his youth within his children's eyes, 
Looks on the snow-clad everlasting hills. 
And marks the sunset smite them, and is glad 
Of the beautiful fair world. 

A springtide land 
It seemed, where East winds came not. Sweetest 

song 
Was everywhere, by glade or sunny plain ; 
And thro' the golden valleys winding streams 



OL YMPUS. 1 79 

Rippled in glancing silver, and above, 
The blue hills rose, and over all a peak. 
White, awful, with a constant fleece of cloud 
Veiling its summit, towered. Unfailing Day 
Lighted it, for no turn of dawn and eve 
Came there, nor changing seasons, but a broad 
Fixed joy of Being, undisturbed by Time. 

There, in a happy glade shut in by groves 
Of laurel and sweet myrtle, on a green 
And flower-lit lawn, I seemed to see the ghosts 
Of the old gods. Upon the gentle slope 
Of a fair hill, a joyous company. 
The Immortals lay. Hard by, a murmurous stream 
Fell thro' the flowers ; below them, space on space, 
Laughed the immeasurable plains ; beyond. 
The mystic mountain soared. Height after height 
Of bare rock ledges left the climbing pines. 
And reared their giddy, shining terraces 
Into the ethereal air. Above, the snows 
Of the white summit cleft the fleece of cloud 
Which always clothed it round. 

Ah, fair and sweet, 
Yet with a ghostly fairness, fine and thin. 
Those godlike Presences. Not dreams indeed. 



l8o THE EPIC OF HADES. 

But something dream-like, were they. Blessed 

Shades 
Heroic and Divine, as when, in days 
When Man was young, and Time, the vivid thought 
Translated into Form the unattained 
Impossible Beauty of men's dreams, and fixed 
The Loveliness in marble. 

As with awe 
Following my spotless guide, I stood apart, 
Not daring to draw near ; a shining form 
Rose from the throng, and floated, light as air, 
To where I trembled. And I knew the face 
And form of Artemis, the fair, the pure, 
The undefiled. A crescent silvery moon 
Shone thro' her locks, and by her side she bore 
A quiver of golden darts. At sight of whom 
I felt a sudden chill, like his who once 
Looked upon her and died ; yet could not fear, 
Seeing how fair she was. Her sweet voice rang 
Clear as a bird's : 

" Mortal, what faith hath brought 
Thee hither, uncleansed by death ? How canst thou 

breathe 
Immortal air, being mortal ? Yet fear not. 
Since thou art come. For we too are of earth 



ARTEMIS. I8l 

Whom here thou seest : there were not a heaven 

Were there no earth, nor gods, had men not been. 

But each the complement of each and grown 

The other's creature, is and has its being, 

A double essence, Human and Divine. 

So that the God is hidden in the man. 

And something Human bounds and forms the God ; 

Which else had shown too great and undefined 

For mortal sight, and having no human eye 

To see it, were unknown. But we who bore 

Sway of old time, we were but attributes 

1 Of the great God who is all Things that be — 

The Pillar of the Earth and starry Sky, 

The Depth of the great Deep ; the Sun, the Moon, 

The Word which Makes ; the All-compelling Love — 

For all Things lie within His Infinite Form." 

Even as she spake, a throng of heavenly forms 
Floated around me, filling all my soul 
With fair unearthly beauty, and the air 
With such ambrosial perfume as is born 
When morning bursts upon a tropic sea, 
From boundless wastes of flowers ; and as I knelt 
In rapture, lo ! the same clear voice again 

' See the Orphic Hymns. 



1 82 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

From oui. the throng of gods : 

" Those whom thou seest 
Were even as I, embodiments of Him 
Who is the Centre of all Life : myself 
The Maiden-Queen of Purity ; and Strength, 
Divine when unabused ; Love too, the Spring 
And Cause of Things ; and Knowledge, which lays 

bare 
Their secret ; and calm Duty, Queen of all, 
And Motherhood in one ; and Youth, which bears, 
Beauty of Form and Life and Light, and breathes 
The breath of Inspiration ; and the Soul, 
The particle of God, sent down to man. 
Which doth in turn reveal the world and God. 

Wherefore it is men called on Artemis, 
The refuge of young souls ; for still in age 
They keep some dim reflection uneffaced 
Of a Diviner Purity than comes 
To the spring days of youth, when all the world 
Smiles, and the rapid blood thro' the young veins 
Courses, and all is glad ; yet knowing too 
That innocence is young — before the soil 
And smirch of sadder knowledge, settling on it, 
Sully its primal whiteness. So they knelt 



ARTEMIS. 183 

At my white shrines, the eager vigorous youths, 
To whom hfe's road showed like a dewy field 
In early summer dawns, when to the sound 
Of youth's clear voice, and to the cheerful rush 
Of the tumultuous feet and clamorous tongues 
Careering onwards, fair and dappled fawns. 
Strange birds with jewelled plumes, fierce spotted 

pards. 
Rise in the joyous chase, to be caught and bound 
By the young conqueror ; nor yet the charm 
Of sensual ease allures. And they knelt too, 
The pure sweet maidens fair and fancy-free, 
Whose innocent virgin hearts shrank from the touch 
Of passion as from wrong — sweet moonlit lives 
Which fade, and pale, and vanish, in the glare 
Of Love's hot noontide : these came robed in white. 
With holy hymns and soaring liturgies : 
And so men fabled me, a huntress now. 
Borne thro' the flying woodlands, fair and free ; 
And now the pale cold Moon, Light without warmth. 
Zeal without touch of passion, heavenly love 
For human, and the altar for the home. 

But oh, how sweet it was to take the love 
And awe of my young worshippers ; to watch 



1 84 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The pure young gaze and hear the pure young voice 

Mount in the hymn, or see the gay troop come 

With the first dawn of day, brushing the dew 

From the unpolluted fields, and wake to song 

The slumbering birds ; strong in their innocence ! 

I did not envy any goddess of all 

The Olympian company her votaries ! 

Ah, happy days of old which now are gone ! 

A memory and a dream ! for now on earth 

I rule no longer o'er young willing hearts 

In voluntary fealty, which should cease 

When Love, with fiery accents calling, woke 

The slumbering soul ; as now he should for those 

Who kneel before the purer, sadder shrine 

Which has replaced my own. But ah ! too oft. 

Not always, but too often, shut from life 

Within pale life-long cloisters and the bars 

Of deadly convent prisons, year by year. 

Age after age, the white souls fade and pine 

Which simulate the joyous service free 

Of those young worshippers. I would that I 

Might loose the captives' chain ; or Herakles, 

Who was a mortal once." 



HERAKLES. 1 85 



But he who stood 
Colossal at my side : 

" I toil no more 
On earth, nor wield again the mighty strength 
Which Zeus once gave me for the cure of ill. 
I have run my race ; I have done my work ; I rest 
For ever from the toilsome days I gave 
To the suffering race of men. And yet, indeed, 
Methinks they suffer still. Tyrannous growths 
And monstrous vex them still. Pestilence lurks 
And sweeps them down. Treacheries come, and 

wars. 
And slay them still. Vaulting ambition leaps 
And falls in bloodshed still. But I am here 
At rest, and no man kneels to me, or keeps 
Reverence for strength mighty yet unabused — 
Strength which is Power, God's choicest gift, more 

rare 
And precious than all Beauty, or the charm 
Of Wisdom, since it is the instrument 
Thro' which all Nature works. For now the earth 
Is full of meekness, and a new God rules, 



1 86 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Teaching strange precepts of humility 
And mercy and forgiveness. Yet I trow- 
There is no lack of bloodshed and deceit 
And groanings, and the tyrant works his wrong 
Even as of old ; but now there is no arm 
Like mine, made strong by Zeus, to beat him down. 
Him and his wrong together. Yet I know 
I am not all discrowned. The strong brave souls, 
The manly tender hearts, whom tale of wrong 
To woman or child, to all weak things and small, 
Fires like a blow ; calling the righteous flush 
Of anger to the brow ; knotting the cords 
Of muscle on the arm ; with one desire 
To hew the spoiler down, and make an end, 
And go their way for others ; making light 
Of toil and pain, and too laborious days, 
And peril ; beat unchanged, albeit they serve 
A Lord of meekness. For the world still needs 
Its champion as of old, and finds him still. 
Not always now with mighty sinews and thews 
Like mine, though still these profit, but keen brain 
And voice to move men's souls to love the right 
And hate the wrong ; even tho' the bodily form 
Be weak, of giant strength, strong to assail 
The hydra heads of Evil, and to slay 



HERAKLES. 1 87 

The monsters that now waste them : Ignorance, 

Self-seeking, coward fears, the hate of Man, 

Disguised as love of God. These there are still 

With task as hard as mine. For what was it 

To strive with bodily ills, and do great deeds 

Of daring and of strength, and bear the crown, 

To his who wages lifelong, doubtful strife 

With an impalpable foe ; conquering indeed, 

But, ere he hears the pcean or sees the pomp, 

Laid low in the arms of Death ? And tho' men cease 

To worship at my shrine, yet not the less 

I hold, it is the toils I knew, the pains 

I bore for others, which have kept the heart 

Of manhood undefiled, and nerved the arm 

Of sacrifice, and made the martyr strong 

To do and bear, and taught the race of men 

How godlike 'tis to suffer thro' life, and die 

At last for others' good ! " 

The strong god ceased, 
And stood a little, musing ; blest indeed. 
But bearing, as it seemed, some faintest trace 
Of earthly struggle still, not the gay ease 
Of the elder heaven-born gods. 



THE EPIC OF HADES. 



And then there came 
Beauty and Joy in one, bearing tlie form 
Of woman. How to reach with halting words 
That infinite perfection ? All have known 
The breathing marbles which the Greek has left 
Who saw her near, and strove to fix her charms, 
And exquisitely failed ; or those fair forms 
The Painter offered at a later shrine, 
And failed. Nay, what are words ? — he knows it 

well 
Who loves, or who has loved. 

She with a smile 
Playing around her rosy lips ; as plays 
The sunbeam on a stream : 

" Shall I complain 
Men kneel to me no longer, taking to them 
Some graver, sterner worship ; grown too wise 
For fleeting joys of Love "i Nay, Love is Youth, 
And still the world is young. Still shall I reign 
Within the hearts of men, while Time shall last 
And Life renews itself. All Life that is. 
From weak things of earth or sea or air. 
Which creep or float for an hour ; to godlike man — 
All know me and are mine. I am the source 



APHRODITE. 189 

And mother of all, both gods and men ; the spring 
Of Force and Joy, which, penetrating all 
Within the hidden depths of the Unknown, 
Sets the blind seed of Being, and from the bond 
Of incomplete and dual Essences 
Evolves the harmony which is Life. The world 
Were dead without my rays, who am the Light 
Which vivifies the world. Nay, but for me. 
The universal order which attracts 
Sphere unto sphere, and keeps them in their paths 
For ever, were no more. All things are bound 
Within my golden chain, whose name is Love. 

And if there be, indeed, some sterner souls 
Or sunk in too much learning, or hedged round 
By care and greed, or haply too much rapt 
By pale ascetic fervors, to delight 
To kneel to me, the universal voice 
Scorns them as those who, missing willingly 
The good that Nature offers, dwell unblest 
Who might be blest, but would not. Every voice 
Of bard in every age has hymned me. All 
The breathing marbles, all the heavenly hues 
Of painting, praise me. Even the loveless shades 
Of dim monastic cloisters show some gleam, 



1 90 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Tho' faint, of me. Amid the busy tlirongs 
Of cities reign I, and o'er lonely plains, 
Beyond the ice-fields of the frozen North, 
And the warm waves of undiscovered seas. 

For I was born out of the sparkling foam 
Which lights the crest of the blue mystic wave, 
Stirred by the wandering breath of Life's pure dawn 
From a young soul's calm depths. There, without 

voice, 
Stretched on the breathing curve of a young breast, 
Fluttering a little, fresh from the great deep 
Of life, and creamy as the opening rose. 
Naked I lie, naked yet unashamed, 
While youth's warm tide steals round me with a 

kiss, 
And floods each limb with fairness. Shame I know 

not — 
Shame is for wrong, and not for innocence — 
The veil which Error grasps to hide itself 
From the awful Eye. But I, I lie unveiled 
And unashamed — the livelong day I lie, 
The warm wave murmuring to me ; and, all night. 
Hidden in the moonlit caves of happy Sleep, 
I dream until the morning and am glad. 



APHRODITE. 191 

Why should I seek to clothe myself, and hide 
The treasure of my Beauty ? Shame may wait 
On those for whom 'twas given. The sties of sense 
Are none of mine ; the brutish, loveless wrong. 
The venal charm, the simulated flush 
Of fleshly passion, they are none of mine, 
Only corruptions of me. Yet I know 
The counterfeit the stronger, since gross souls 
And brutish sway the earth ; and yet I hold 
That sense itself is sacred, and I deem 
'Twere better to grow soft and sink in sense 
Than gloat o'er blood and wrong. 

My kingdom is 
Over infinite grades of being. All breathing things, 
From the least crawling insect to the brute, 
From brute to man, confess me. Yet in man 
I find my worthiest worship. Wliere man is, 
A youth and a maid, a youth and a maid, naught 

else 
Is wanting for my temple. Every clime 
Kneels to me — the long breaker swells and falls 
Under the palms, mixed with the merry noise 
Of savage bridals, and the straight brown limbs 
Know me, and over all the endless plains 
I reign, and by the tents on the hot sand 



192 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And sea-girt isles am queen, and on the side 
Of silent mountains, where the white cots gleam 
Upon the green hill pastures, and no sound 
But the thunder of the avalanche is borne 
To the listening rocks around ; and in fair lands 
Where all is peace ; where thro' the happy hush 
Of tranquil summer evenings, mid the corn. 
Or thro' cool arches of the gadding vines, 
The lovers stray together hand in hand. 
Hymning my praise ; and by the stately streets 
Of echoing cities — over all the earth. 
Palace and cot, mountain and plain and sea. 
The burning South, the icy North, the old 
And immemorial East, the unbounded West, 
No new god comes to spoil me utterly — 
All worship and are mine ! " 

With a sweet smile 
Upon her rosy mouth, the goddess ceased ; 
And when she spake no more, the silence weighed 
As heavy on my soul as when it takes 
Some gracious melody, and leaves the ear 
Unsatisfied and longing, till the fount 
Of sweetness springs again. 



ATHENE. 193 



But while I stood 
Expectant, lo ! a fair pale form drew near 
With front severe, and wide blue eyes which bore 
Mild wisdom in their gaze. Great purity 
Shone from her — not the young-eyed innocence 
Of her whom first I saw, but that which comes 
From wider knowledge, which restrains the tide 
Of passionate youth, and leads the musing soul 
By the calm deeps of Wisdom. And I knew 
My eyes had seen the fair, the virgin Queen, 
Who once within her shining Parthenon 
Beheld the sages kneel. 

She with clear voice 
And coldly sweet, yet with a softness too. 
As doth befit a virgin : 

" She does right 
To boast her sway, my sister, seeing indeed 
That all things are as by a double law. 
And from a double root the tree of Life 
Springs up to the face of heaven. Body and Soul, 
Matter and Spirit, lower joys of Sense 
And higher joys of Thought, I know that both 



194 "T^E EPIC OF HADES. 

Build up the shrine of Being. The brute sense 
Leaves man a brute ; but, winged with soaring 

thought, 
Mounts to high heaven. The unembodied spirit. 
Dwelling alone, unmated, void of sense, 
Is impotent. And yet I hold there is, 
Far off, but not too far for mortal reach, 
A calmer height, where, nearer to the stars. 
Thought sits alone and gazes with rapt gaze, 
A large-eyed maiden in a robe of white. 
Who brings the light of Knowledge down, and 

draws 
To her pontifical eyes a bridge of gold. 
Which spans from earth to heaven. 

For what were life, 
If things of sense were all, for those large souls 
And high, which grudging Nature has shut fast 
Within unlovely forms, or those from whom 
The circuit of the rapid gliding years 
Steals the brief gift of beauty ? Shall we hold, 
With idle singers, all the treasure of hope 
Is lost with youth — swift-fleeting, treacherous youth, 
Which fades and flies before the ripening brain 
Crowns life with Wisdom's crown ? Nay, even in 

youth, 



ATHENE. 195 

Is it not more to walk upon the heights 

Alone — the cold free heights — and mark the vale 

Lie breathless in the glare, or hidden and blurred 

By cloud and storm ; or pestilence and war 

Creep on with blood and death ; while the soul 

dwells 
Apart upon the peaks, outfronts the sun 
As the eagle does, and takes the coming dawn 
While all the vale is dark, and knows the springs 
Of tiny rivulets hurrying from the snows, 
Which soon shall swell to vast resistless floods, 
And feed the Oceans which divide the World ? 

Oh, ecstasy ! oh, wonder ! oh, delight ! 
Which neither the slow-withering wear of Time, 
Which takes all else — the smooth and rounded 

cheek 
Of youth ; the lightsome step ; the warm young heart 
Which beats for love or friend ; the treasure of hope 
Immeasurable; the quick-coursing blood 
Which makes it joy to be, — ay, takes them all 
And leaves us naught — nor yet satiety 
Born of too full possession, takes or mars ! 
Oh, fair delight of learning ! which grows great 
And stronger and more keen, for slower limbs, 



ig6 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And dimmer eyes and loneliness, and loss 

Of lower good — wealth, friendship, ay, and Love — 

When the swift soul, turning its weary gaze 

From the old vanished joys, projects itself 

Into the void and floats in empty space. 

Striving to reach the mystic source of Things, 

The secrets of the earth and sea and air. 

The Law that holds the process of the suns. 

The awful depths of Mind and Thought ; the prime 

Unfathomable mystery of God ! 

Is there, then, any who holds my worship cold 
And lifeless ? Nay, but 'tis the light which cheers 
The waning life ! Love thou thy love, brave youth ! 
Cleave to thy love, fair maid ! it is the Law 
Which dominates the world, that bids ye use 
Your nature ; but, when now the fuller tide 
Slackens a little, turn your calmer eyes 
To the fair page of Knowledge. It is power 
I give, and power is precious. It is strength 
To live four-square, careless of outward shows, 
And self-sufiicing. It is clearer sight 
To know the rule of life, the Eternal scheme; 
And, knowing it, to do and not to err, » 

And, doing, to be blest." 



ATHENE. 197 

The calm voice soared 
Higher and higher to the close ; the cold 
Clear accents, fired as by a hidden fire, 
Glowed into life and tenderness, and throbbed 
As with some spiritual ecstasy 
Sweeter than that of Love. 



198 THE EPIC OF HADES. 



But as they died, 
I heard an ampler voice ; and looking, marked 
A fair and gracious form. She seemed a Queen 
Who ruled o'er gods and men ; the majesty 
Of perfect womanhood. No youthful bud 
Of beauty, but the full consummate flower 
Was hers ; and from her mild large eyes looked forth 
Gentle command, and motherhood, and home. 
And pure affection. Awe and reverence 
O'erspread me, as I knew my eyes had looked 
On sovereign Her(^, mother of the gods. 

She, with clear, rounded utterance, sweet and 
calm : 
" I know Love's fruit is good and fair to see 
And taste, if any gain it, and I know 
How brief Life's Passion-tide, which when it ends 
May change to thirst for Knowledge, and I know 
How fair the realm of Mind, wherein the soul 
Thirsting to know, wings its impetuous way 
Beyond the bounds of Thought ; and yet I hold 
There is a higher bliss than these, which fits 



HERE. 199 

A mortal life, compact of Body and Soul, 
And therefore double-natured — a calm path 
Which lies before the feet, thro' common ways 
And undistinguished crowds of toiling men. 
And yet is hard to tread, tho' seeming smooth, 
And yet, tho' level, earns a worthier crown. 

For Knowledge is a steep which few may climb. 
While Duty is a path which all may tread. 
And if the Soul of Life and Thought be this, 
How best to speed the mighty scheme, which still 
Fares onward day by day — the Life of the World, 
Which is the sum of petty lives, that live 
And die so this may live — how then shall each 
Of that great multitude of faithful souls 
Who walk not on the heights, fulfil himself, 
But by the duteous Life which looks not forth 
Beyond its narrow sphere, and finds its work, 
And works it out ; content, this done, to fall 
And perish, if Fate will, so the great Scheme 
Goes onward } 

Wherefore am I, Queen in Heaven 
And Earth, whose realm is Duty, bearing rule 
More constant and more wide than those whose words 
Thou heardest last. Mine are the striving souls 



200 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Of fathers toiling day by day obscure 
And unrewarded, save by their own hearts, 
Mid wranglings of the Forum or the mart ; 
Who long for joys of Thought, and yet must toil 
Unmurmuring thro' dull lives from youth to age ; 
Who haply might have worn instead the crown 
Of Honor and of Fame : mine the fair mothers 
Who, for the love of children and of home. 
When passion dies, expend their toilful years 
In loving labor sweetened by the sense 
Of Duty : mine the statesman who toils on 
Thro' vigilant nights and days, guiding his State, 
Yet finds no gratitude ; and those white souls 
Who give themselves for others all their years 
In trivial tasks of Pity. The fine growths 
Of Man and Time are mine, and spend themselves 
For me and for the mystical End which lies 
Beyond their gaze and mine, and yet is good, 
Tho' hidden from men and gods. 

For as the flower 
Of the tiger-lily bright with varied hues 
Is for a day, then fades and leaves behind 
Fairness nor fruit, while the green tiny tuft 
Swells to the purple of the clustering grape 
Or golden waves of wheat; so lives of men 



HERE. 201 

Which show most splendid, fade and are deceased 

And leave no trace ; while those, unmarked, unseen. 

Which no man recks of, rear the stately tree 

Of Knowledge, not for itself sought out, but found 

In the dusty ways of life — a fairer growth 

Than springs in cloistered shades ; and from the sum 

Of Duty, blooms sweeter and more divine 

The fair ideal of the Race, than comes 

From ghttering gains of Learning. 

Life, full life. 
Full-flowered, full-fruited, reared from homely earth, 
Rooted in duty, and thro' long calm years 
Bearing its load of healthful energies ; 
Stretching its arms on all sides ; fed with dews 
Of cheerful sacrifice, and clouds of care. 
And rain of useful tears ; warmed by the sun 
Of calm affection, till it breathes itself 
In perfume to the heavens — this is the prize 
I hold most dear, more precious than the fruit 
Of Knowledge or of Love." 

The goddess ceased 
As dies some gracious harmony, the child 
Of wedded themes which single and alone 
Were discords, but united breathe a sound 
Sweet as the sounds of heaven. 



202 THE EPIC OF HADES. 



And then stood forth 
The last of the gods I saw, the first in rank 
And dignity and beauty, the young god 
Who grows not old, the Light of Heaven and Earth, 
The Worker from afar, who sends the fire 
Of inspiration to the bard and bathes 
The world in hues of heaven — the golden link 
Between High God and Man. 

With a sweet voice 
Whose every note was sweetest melody — 
The melody has fled, the words remain — 
Apollo sang : 

» I know how fair the face 
Of Purity ; I know the treasure of Strength ; 
I know the charm of Love, the calmer grace 
Of Wisdom and of duteous well-spent lives : 
And yet there is a loftier height than these. 

There is a Height higher than mortal thought ; 
There is a Love warmer than mortal love ; 
There is a Life which taketh not its hues 
From Earth or earthly things ; and so grows pure 



APOLLO. 203 

And higher than the petty cares of men, 
And is a blessed Hfe and glorified. 

Oh, white young souls, strain upward, upward still, 
Even to the heavenly source of Purity ! 
Brave hearts, bear on and suffer ! Strike for right. 
Strong arms, and hew down wrong ! The world 

hath need 
Of all of you — the sensual, wrongful world ! — 

Hath need of you, and of thee too, fair Love. 
Oh, lovers, cling together ! the old world 
Is full of Hate. Sweeten it ; draw in one 
Tv/o separate chords of Life ; and from the bond 
Of twin souls lost in Harmony create 
A Fair God dwelling with you — Love, the Lord ! 

Waft yourselves, yearning souls, upon the stars ; 
Sow yourselves on the wandering winds of space ; 
Watch patient all your days, if your eyes take 
Some dim, cold ray of Knowledge. The dull world 
Hath need of you — the purblind, slothful world ! 

Live on, brave lives, chained to the narrow round 
Of Duty ; live, expend yourselves, and make 



204 ^'-^^ ^/'/C OF HADES. 

The orb of Being wheel onward steadfastly 
Upon its path — the Lord of Life alone 
Knows to what goal of Good ; work on, live on : 
And yet there is a higher work than yours. 

To have looked upon the face of the Unknown 
And Perfect Beauty. To have heard the voice 
Of Godhead in the winds and in the seas. 
To have known Him in the circHng of the suns, 
And in the changeful fates and lives of men. 

To be fulfilled of Godhead as a cup 
Filled with a precious essence, till the hand 
On marble or on canvas falling, leaves 
Celestial traces, or from reed or string 
Draws out faint echoes of the voice Divine 
That bring God nearer to a faithless world. 

Or, higher still and fairer and more blest, 
To be His seer, His prophet ; to be the voice 
Of the Ineffable Word ; to be the glass 
Of the Ineffable Light, and bring them down 
To bless the earth, set in a shrine of Song. 

For Knowledge is a barren tree and bare 
Bereft of God, and Duty but a word, 



APOLLO. 205 

And Strength but Tyranny, and Love, Desire, 

And Purity a folly ; and the Soul, 

Which brings down God to Man, the Light to the 

world ; 
He is the Maker, and is blest, is blest! " 

He ended, and I felt my soul grow faint 
With too much sweetness. 

In a mist of grace 
They faded, that bright company, and seemed 
To melt into each other and shape themselves 
Into new forms, and those fair goddesses 
Blent in a perfect woman — all the calm 
High motherhood of Her^, the sweet smile 
Of Cypris, fair Athene's earnest eyes, 
And the young purity of Artemis, 
Blent in a perfect woman ; and in her arms, 
Fused by some cosmic interlacing curves 
Of Beauty into a new Innocence, 
A child with eyes divine, a little child, 
A little child — no more. 

And those great gods 
Of Power and Beauty left a heavenly form 
Strong not to act, but suffer; fair and meek. 
Not proud and eager ; with soft eyes of grace, 



206 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Not bold with joyous youth ; and for the fire 

Of song, and for the happy careless life, 

A sorrowful pilgrimage — changed, yet the same ; 

Only Diviner far; and keeping still 

The Life God-lighted and the sacrifice. 

And when these faded wholly, at my side, 
Tho' hidden before by those too-radiant forms, 
I was aware once more of her, my guide 
Psyche, who had not left me, floating near 
On golden wings ; and all the plains of heaven 
Were left to us, me and my soul alone. 

Then when my thought revived again, I said 
Whispering, " But Zeus I saw not, the prime Source 
And Sire of all the gods." 

And she bent low 
With downcast eyes. "Nay. Thou hast seen of 

Him 
All that thine eyes can bear, in those fair forms 
Which are but parts of Him and are indeed 
Attributes of the Substance which supports 
The Universe of Things — the Soul of the World, 
The Stream which flows Eternal, from no Source 
Into no Sea. His Purity, His Strength, 



ZEUS. * 207 

His Love, His Knowledge, His unchanging rule 

Of Duty, thou hast seen, only a part 

And not the whole, being a finite mind 

Too weak for infinite thought ; nor, couldst thou see 

All of Him visible to mortal sight, 

Wouldst thou see all His essence, since the gods — 

Glorified essences of Human mould. 

Who are but Zeus made visible to men — 

See Him not wholly, only some thin edge 

And halo of His glory ; nor know they 

What vast and unsuspected Universes 

Lie beyond thought, where yet He rules, like those 

Vast Suns we cannot see, round which our Sun 

Moves with his system, or those darker still 

Which not even thus we know, but yet exist 

Tho' no eye marks, nor thought itself, and lurk 

In the awful Depths of Space ; or that which is 

Not orbed as yet, but indiscrete, confused. 

Sown thro' the void — the faintest gleam of light 

Which sets itself to Be. And yet is He 

There too, and rules, none seeing. But sometimes 

To this our heaven, which is so like to earth 

But nearer to Him, for awhile He shows 

Some gleam of His own brightness, and methinks 

It Cometh soon ; but thou, if thou shouldst gaze, 



208 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

Thy Life will rush to His — the tiny spark 

Absorbed in that full blaze — and what there is 

Of mortal fall from thee." 

But I : " Oh, soul, 

What holdeth Life more precious than to know 

The Giver and to die ? " 

Then she : " Behold ! 
Look upward and adore." 

And with the word, 
Unhasting, undelaying, gradual, sure. 
The floating cloud which clothed the hidden peak 
Rose slow in awful silence, laying bare 
Spire after rocky spire, snow after snow, 
Whiter and yet more dreadful, till at last 
It left the summit clear. 

Then with a bound. 
In the twinkling of an eye, in the flash of a thought, 
I knew an Awful Effluence of Light, 
Formless, Ineffable, Perfect, burst on me 
And flood my being round, and take my life 
Into itself. I saw my guide bent down 
Prostrate, her wings before her face ; and then 
No more. 



THE EPIC OF HADES. 209 

But when I woke from my long trance 

Behold, it was no longer Tartarus, 

Nor Hades, nor Olympus, but the bare 

And unideal aspect of the fields 

Which Spring not yet had kissed — the strange old 

Earth 

So far more fabulous now than in the days 

When Man was young, nor yet the mystery 

Of human life transformed it. From the hills, 

The long night fled at last, the unclouded sun. 

The dear, fair sun, leapt upward swift, and smote 

My sight with rays of gold, and pierced my brain 

With too much light ere my entranced eyes 

Could hide themselves. 

And I was on the Earth 

Dreaming the dream of Life again, as late 

I dreamed the dream of Death. 

Another day 

Dawned on the race of men ; another world ; 

New heavens, and new earth. 



2IO THE EPIC OF HADES. 



And as I went 
Across the lightening fields, upon a bank 
I saw a single snowdrop glance, and bring 
Promise of Spring ; and keeping my old thought 
In the old fair Hellenic vesture dressed, 
I felt myself a ghost, and seemed to be 
Now fair Adonis hasting to the arms 
Of his lost love — now sad Persephone 
Restored to mother earth — or that high shade 
Orpheus, who gave up heaven to save his love. 
And is rewarded — or young Marsyas, 
Who spent his youth and life for song, and yet 
Was happy though in torture — or the fair 
And dreaming youth I saw, who still awaits. 
Hopeful, the unveiling heaven, when he shall see 
His fair ideal love. The birds sang blithe ; 
There came a tinkling from the waking fold ; 
And on the hillside from the cot a girl 
Tripped singing with her pitcher. All the sounds 
And thoughts which still are beautiful — Youth. 

Song, 
Dawn, Spring, Renewal — and my soul was glad 



THE EPIC OF HADES. 2 1 I 

Of all the freshness, and I felt again 

The you Hi and spring-tide of the world, and thought, 

Which feigned those fair and gracious fantasies. 

For every dawn that breaks brings a new world, 
And every budding bosom a new life ; 
These fair tales, which we know so beautiful, 
Show only finer than our lives to-day 
Because their voice was clearer, and they found 
A sacred bard to sing them. We are pent. 
Who sing to-day, by all the garnered wealth 
Of ages of past song. We have no more 
The world to choose from, who, where'er we turn. 
Tread through old thoughts and fair. Yet must we 

sing — 
We have no choice ; and if more hard the toil 
In noon, when all is clear, than in the fresh 
White mists of early morn, yet do we find 
Achievement its own guerdon, and at last 
The rounder song of manhood grows more sweet 
Than the high note of youth. 

For Age, long Age ! 
Naught else divides us from the fresh young days 
Which men call ancient ; seeing that we in turn 
Shall one day be Time's ancients, and inspire 



212 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

The wiser, higher race, which yet shall sing 
Because to sing is human, and high thought 
Grows rhythmic ere its close. Naught else there is 
But that weird beat of Time, which doth disjoin 
To-day from Hellas, 

How should any hold 
Those precious scriptures only old-world tales 
Of strange impossible torments and false gods ; 
Of men and monsters in some brainless dream. 
Coherent, yet unmeaning, linked together 
By some false skein of song? 

Nay! evermore, 
All things and thoughts, both new and old, are writ 
Upon the unchanging human heart and soul. 
Has Passion still no prisoners .-^ Pine there now 
No lives which fierce Love, sinking into Lust, 
Has drowned at last in tears and blood — plunged 

down 
To the lowest depths of Hell ? Have not strong 

Will 
And high Ambition rotted into Greed 
And Wrong, for any, as of old, and whelmed 
The struggling soul in ruin t Hell lies near 
Around us as does Heaven, and in the World, 
Which is our Hades, still the chequered souls 



THE EPIC OF HADES. 213 

Compact of good and ill — not all accurst 
Nor altogether blest — a few brief years 
Travel the little journey of their lives, 
They know not to what end. The weary woman 
Sunk deep in ease and sated with her life, 
Much loved and yet unloving, pines to-day 
As Helen ; still the poet strives and sings. 
And hears Apollo's music, and grows dumb, 
And suffers, yet is happy ; still the young 
Fond dreamer seeks his high ideal love. 
And finds her name is Death ; still doth the fair 
And innocent life, bound naked to the rock. 
Redeem the race ; still the gay tempter goes 
And leaves his victim, stone ; still doth pain bind 
Men's souls in closer links of lovingness, 
Than Death itself can sever ; still the sight 
Of too great beauty blinds us, and we lose 
The sense of earthly splendors, gaining Heaven. 

And still the skies are opened as of old 
To the entranced gaze, ay, nearer far 
And brighter than of yore ; and Might is there. 
And Infinite Purity is there, and high 
Eternal Wisdom, and the calm clear face 
Of Duty, and a higher, stronger Love 



214 THE EPIC OF HADES. 

And Light in one, and a new, reverend Name, 
Greater than any and combining all ; 
And over all, veiled with a veil of cloud, 
God set far off, too bright for mortal eyes. 

And always, always, with each soul that comes 
And goes, comes that fair form which was my guide, 
Hovering, with golden wings and eyes divine. 
Above the bed of birth, the bed of death. 
Still breathing heavenly airs of deathless love. 

For while a youth is lost in soaring thought. 
And while a maid grows sweet and beautiful. 
And while a spring-tide coming lights the earth, 
And while a child, and while a flower is born, 
And while one wrong cries for redress and finds 
A soul to answer, still the world is young ! 



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